Six Times, Together
by Starlight Lion
Summary: "It's called coalescence." Six times apart, and the one time together.
1. Lance, of Water

**Okay so this is a little side project that literally bit me in the face and I found myself writing one day in a fever dream. I'm actually working on a totally different fic (sort of a post-season 2 divergence, I guess it comes under fix-it but honestly it mostly just makes things go much much worse let's be fucking real). ANYWAY.**

 **This one has swearing and magic and insanity. I'll rate it up because there is a bit of gore, and knowing me the other chapters will have gore too, but it's not super graphic. I'll warn on the other chapters if it gets really bad.**

 **There will be six chapters in total! As you could probably guess from the title.**

 **Enjoy my little sidepiece!**

* * *

The first time Lance did it, he took an entire battlecruiser down with him.

* * *

Pain sang in Lance's right shoulder as he ran- _sprinted_ \- down the halls, leaping over the smoking ruins of sentries. His own footsteps thundered in his head, shuddering up his spine out of time with the red throbbing in his eyes; his heart drummed in his chest, too fast for him to pick out individual beats. Too fast from adrenaline and exertion and- _fear_.

How the hell had this mission gone so wrong?

They'd meant to sneak in - two cruisers, two parties - and just get what they needed from the databanks. Easy in, easy out. A mission they'd done dozens of times. It was a little sticky, trying to coordinate on two cruisers, but their radios reached that far - bounced along by the Green and Blue Lions - so they'd managed the _in_ part just fine.

Hunk, as expected, had taken longer than Pidge to get into the cruiser's systems. He was an engineer at heart, not a techie - he was running on an eight hour crash course the day before. Lance was on board with Hunk and Shiro; they'd expected more trouble, so they'd been the bigger team. Right now, Lance was wishing they'd stuck to the safety-in-numbers thing.

It hadn't been his fault, really. _Seriously_. But they'd swept through the sentries that had found them without issue, fast enough to earn a brief pause. Shiro in the front, Lance perched behind a little, sniping whatever Shiro missed.

And god, but seeing Shiro fight never got any less unsettling. The man just… let loose something. Maybe it was the arm; maybe it was the torture he'd been put through to get it. It made Lance's skin crawl, if he thought about it too long. So of course, when Hunk had reported Galra approaching - actual, flesh-blood soldiers - Lance had popped up before Shiro could speak and offered to distract them.

" _I got this! Stay here, Shiro!"_ And already out the door.

…

Okay. _Offered_ was too diplomatic a word. But while Lance held no affection for the Galra Empire and its soldiers… it still sat wrong, watching Shiro tear them apart without hesitation. At least if Lance got their attention, he could just disable them. It had to be better than murdering them.

Of course, getting caught full in the back with a shot from an energy rifle hadn't exactly endeared the bastards to him either. It hadn't been until Lance had toppled forward, rolled, and collided with the the corner - taking the impact directly on his shoulder - that he'd started to regret his decision.

 _Kind of starting to wish Shiro had killed them._

But now- now it was just running, bayard clutched tight in one hand but unformed - the rifle was too clunky for fleeing. And he _was_ fleeing. He'd already shot four of them. Well- technically, he'd shot sixteen of them, but twelve had only been in the kneecaps. Four of them… Three had been in the chest; one had slipped at the last second and torn through the soldier's throat.

But Lance kept running, because they were still chasing and he was still ducking energy shots and skidding madly around corners.

"Hunk? Shiro! Are you guys done yet? I-" Lance broke off, letting out a sharp yell as he skidded around a corner only to see another contingent of soldiers coming at him at the far end. "Oh, shit- Guys!"

" _Just finishing up now, Lance. Try to make your way back to us, if you can."_

Oh! Oh, _that_ was a great idea! "Oh yeah, of course, Shiro, that didn't occur to me - I'll just _do that_!" Maybe it came out hysterical, but Lance was currently looking around - frantic - because he was pinned in this hallway.

He was met with a moment of static, before Shiro responded again. " _Okay, Lance. I'm coming for y-"_

"Are you insane?!" Lance yelped, flinging himself against the wall, behind one of the wide ribs that filled Galra architecture, so that only the ones chasing him could see him. For now. Bracing himself against the wall, Lance lifted his bayard and- _touched it with his soul-_ and channelled quintessence into it. He knew the feeling by now, but he tried not to think about it. It was instinctual, and Lance could never touch his quintessence otherwise. (He'd tried. A lot).

The weapon glowed, Lance's energy becoming matter as the bayard's mass and weight increased, expanding in his hands. A familiar sensation, into a familiar shape.

For a moment, even as Lance tightened his grip and then forced himself to relax it, even as he took a breath and tilted his head and closed one eye, even then, his heart sank in his chest. It was a hollow feeling - a numb one. _I'm going to kill these Galra._ And they were Galra and they deserved it, and it was war and he was justified, but it was still murder - and he was still responsible.

 _I'm prepared for this. I accept the consequences._

Shiro was still talking to him, a distracting rattle on the radio, but Lance blocked it out. Shiro would come or he wouldn't - he would abandon Hunk (who was by all accounts the weakest fighter of them all, not that it mattered when he contributed so much else) - or he wouldn't. Lance exhaled until his lungs were empty, his body still, and then fired a shot. The trigger offered the tiniest resistance, just enough to give a satisfying _click_ as it compressed, and then the shot screamed through the lead Galra's head and she sprawled to the floor in a mess of her own brain and bright purple blood. The rifle didn't even twitch his hands; and Lance was already shifting, aiming at the next Galra and squeezing off the shot.

He got off nineteen shots before the others reached him. Eighteen Galra lay dead before him, bodies sprawled unnaturally, blood puddling under the pile, bright and sticky. Black stains dotted the mass of corpses, the stench of shit and scorched fur filling the air. It was almost a relief when the second group of Galra reached him, grabbing at him.

 _Blue. Please, Blue._

And she was right there, swelling into his mind, arctic water trickling in through every crevice. A low pressure rumbled through him, Blue's comforting purr. The nausea fell away, the fear, the dread, the guilt. Ice had filled his body, replacing his blood with liquid nitrogen - his breath fogged the air as he breathed.

They were trying to kill him. They were trying to capture him and do worse. _Unacceptable._ Blue would not lose another Paladin. Lance would not allow it. _She loved him._

His eyes were cold as he kicked out, still braced against the wall. The deep blue had turned frozen, his breath a steady winter wind in his body, while Blue's tide roared through his mind and she watched through his senses. They were in danger. They would fight back.

It was not the first time that Lance had done this. It would not be the last. Blue and Lance were one, Lance's body and Blue's strength; the Lion felt no guilt, no mercy. If she must kill, then she must. She did not apologise for what was necessary. Right now, Lance needed that. He needed to fight, or he would die.

But the bodies lay before him, their faces engraved in his mind, his bayard warm in his hands. Without Blue, all he could feel was the threat of scorch marks on his hands, thoroughly protected by his gloves - the ache that he would feel later, when their faces came back to haunt him. When it was dark and silent and lonely.

So Blue pressed into every part of him, released a roar - a call to action. Lance kicked his feet into the Galra's chest, throwing his weight up, and then pressed the barrel of his bayard to her head.

Beautifully cold, every movement like the flow of rain, Lance fired, three times, pushing away. For a single, precarious moment, Lance hung suspended in the air, upside down, his body arching and twisting simultaneously. Then, the blizzard hit them all.

Lance kicked off the wall and went sailing over their heads, igniting his jetpack and spinning midair. The rifle rose, and Lance saw the whole world tinged in blue, as if his bullets' paths were already mapped and destined. He squeezed off five shots (five deaths) before he landed.

Sideways. Skidded back ten feet, baring his teeth and trying to aim accurately as he went. Four more shots went off before he collided with the far wall - four more shots missed wildly.

There were only a few Galra left here, now. Blue surged up inside him, bringing Lance to his feet almost without his consent, rifle lifting, taking aim. The soldiers hesitated, stepping away from him - aware that engaging him meant death. But Lance couldn't see clearly through the azure haze anymore, and Blue's growling was the only thing he could feel, eclipsing his heartbeat, eclipsing his breath.

 _They were trying to hurt him. Blue would not let anyone hurt him._

Lance tilted his head, closed one eye, and took aim. One of the Galra's heads blew apart. Frost filled Lance's lungs, thoughts frozen; the inside of his mind was just a constant quivering growl, the touch of the ocean at midnight - water over his head, encasing him completely, dragging him out like a riptide. _They will not harm me- you- my Paladin- my Lance._ Another of the Galra collapsed, his chest blown open, tiny glinting bones exposed as he fell, and bled.

" _Lance!"_ came the distant shouting, just barely piercing the rushing water that filled his body. " _Lance, where are you? Get back to Blue, we're done! Are you okay, Lance?"_

Back to Blue…? It didn't make sense, even as the last remaining soldiers turned tail and ran. Lance stepped forward, aiming carefully, and shot one clean through the back of the neck. He flew forward, sprawling, and the last soldier tripped on his limbs, slamming into the floor face first. Back to Blue? Why did he need to go _back_ when Blue was right here inside him, beside him, filling every crevice that he had to spare? The steady cold was in him, part of him. A deep, infinite ocean - fathomless - doubtless.

" _Lance, respond!"_ Scared. Shiro - Sable Paladin - sounded scared.

Lance approached the last Galra, even as she twisted on the floor and stared up at him, eyes wide. _Scared._ What was their creed, again? Holding his stance, Lance set his feet by the soldier's face and hefted his rifle, aiming right between her eyes. "Victory or death."

Her face ruptured into blood and brain and smouldering fur.

" _Lance?"_ That was Hunk- Yellow Paladin- his best friend. " _Where are you, Lance?"_

"Safe."

" _We can deal with this later, Hunk."_ Sable Paladin- Shiro- he sounded… strange. Strained. " _Lance, we're ready to get the hell out of here. Make your way back to your Lion."_

It still didn't make sense, not really. His Lion was right here, he was with her - _was_ her. But Lance nodded, letting his quintessence drain from the rifle until it morphed back into its dormant state, before locking it into his Paladin armour. He would obey the Black's orders; that was how it should be. "Yes-" Shiro. Sable? No. "Yes, Black Paladin."

* * *

" _Yes-"_ Lance stopped, suddenly, as if he didn't know what to call him. Shiro's heart skipped, even as he kept slinking through the ship, Hunk on his heels. As if they needed to add anymore proof that something was wrong with Lance. Was it even Lance? _Victory or Death._ What reason did he have to be reciting the Galran mantra? But he had - and only after the sounds of an impressive firefight. " _Yes, Black Paladin."_

Shiro and Hunk stared at each other for a long moment, until Hunk quietly - guiltily - reached up and silenced his microphone. "What… What's wrong with him, Shiro?"

Footsteps. Shiro waved Hunk into silence and pressed back against the wall, pressing a hand against Hunk's chestplate to keep him back too. He didn't think the younger Paladin needed the touch, but Shiro couldn't help it. He was guiding Hunk through this battlecruiser; he had to make certain Hunk stayed safe.

After a full minute, Shiro relaxed slightly again, peeked around the corner, and then beckoned Hunk after him. A second and his microphone was muted too. "I don't know, Hunk. But we can't do anything about it here. We have to get back to base first. We can… look after him there."

Hunk didn't seem reassured, but that was hardly surprising. Shiro wasn't being particularly reassuring. Carefully, they made their way towards the Blue Lion where she waited, silently praying that Lance would be there.

He wasn't.

Shiro tried desperately to swallow back the panic in his throat, kept his face as neutral as he could. In Hunk's eyes was the same fear - if Shiro showed it, Hunk would only worsen. "Hunk, get in the Blue Lion. She'll keep you safe. I'll go find Lance."

Wide-eyed, Hunk shook his head. "Shiro, you shouldn't go back out there alone. What if you can't find him? What if he's already… I dunno, something! What if you get hurt as well? What-"

"Hunk." It was sharp; a command. He had to maintain control of this situation. _No point, it's already out of control_. Shiro boxed that thought. "Get inside Blue. We'll attract more attention together than just me alone. And we can't leave Lance out there."

Hunk nodded, bullied into seeing the logic by Shiro's tone, but his eyes were shining - on the verge of tears. "Okay. Just… stay safe. Okay?"

Forcing a smile, Shiro reached out and put a hand - his _human_ hand - on Hunk's shoulder. "Of course, Hunk. Now get inside. I'll be right back, I promise."

But, of course, Shiro broke that promise.

* * *

They were running again - but this time, they weren't fleeing. They were racing, _rushing_ through the ship, following orders but unthreatened, unbound. The world was a flowing river, and they were screaming rapids - and they obliterated whatever dared cross them.

They were heading back to… to the place they were. It was… too hard to parse beyond that. Sable Paladin had ordered them return, so return they would. Few enemies stood in their way, so little prey left on this ship. So instead they just moved, bounded down the hallways and around corners, following the link between their mind and their… her…? form. They were wild and flowing and free, and there was nothing they feared.

And so they didn't see it coming.

Careening around a corner, momentum taking them into a leap and then springboarding off the far wall so as not to lose any, almost back to… _home_ \- almost there. They leapt off the wall, sailing through the air - right over the head of a Galra soldier.

Something bright flashed out, and they twisted midair - achieved nothing. Pain opened in their side, a touch that burned cold on their skin and flowed in deep. They- _Lance_ \- He hit the floor and crumpled, rolling. Something pushed against the pain, tore it sideways, and they let out a scream as they- he skidded to a stop.

The Galra came closer.

 _Lance, he was Lance-_

 _Oh god, he'd killed-_

 _ **So many.**_

The Galra came closer.

Lance couldn't move, could barely- He looked down, hands shaking, looking for why it _hurt_ so much. Shiny black and silver, it stuck out from his side, stuck clean through the flexible waist of his armour; a Galra blade. Purple winked at him - _a grip?_ \- and red pulsed out from behind it, spreading, staining, _everywhere_.

"B-Blue," Lance managed, looking up into the Galra's eyes, glinting solid yellow in the light. _Blue!_

This time, she didn't push into him from the cracks. The water of her mind didn't trickle and then rush in and fill up the space his thoughts left behind. Blue _broke_ , the walls in Lance's mind bursting apart like a dam wall under too much pressure. Water filled his mind, drowned him from the inside out. Her quintessence vented through their bond, from her body to his - a geyser of ice that he couldn't fight or control.

Lance didn't even try.

He screamed again, his breath a white fog that clouded above his head. His skin felt like it might split open, the cascade of energy overwhelming his body, his senses, his mind. Lance couldn't think about anything else - couldn't _remember_ anything else. It was just Blue and _blue_ and liquid ice crashing down on him like a tsunami. His eyes were wide, unseeing; the irises glowed, colour widening, eclipsing the sclerae, the pupils.

They turned gold.

For a single, brief moment, Lance screamed - an unearthly, pealing sound. His breath was frozen in the air, an opaque white mist, and frost formed across his Paladin armour in whorls, beautiful patterns that crossed and crossed and spread until everything was rimed, and the patterns exploded out across the hall. His blood froze where it had bled, shining crimson ice.

The Galra's feet froze to the floor. Light began to bleed out of Lance, a searing white-blue light; cold. It burned. Lance felt it press out of every pore, an overflow of power, quintessence scorching and freezing at the same time. Tears crept from his eyes, but they chilled to ice immediately - stuck to his skin, the soft skin just under his eyes and on the inner curve of his nose. His eyelashes were coated in frost - tears froze to ice against his corneas, blinding him. The rushing of Blue's quintessence, her magic, her _soul_ , filled Lance's ears, infinite, immense - a screaming, frozen waterfall.

And yet, Blue didn't stop, didn't pull back. Her power kept streaming in, gushing - swelling until the only thing Lance could do was burst.

* * *

"Shiro, have you found him yet?" Pidge was quiet in her pilot seat, tirelessly working. Somehow, she was following three screens at once, even as new information scrolled across all of them, tracking everything. She was flying, too, keeping the Green Lion moving, keeping it out of range of Galra attack, keeping them safe.

Keith was about to lose his fucking mind, standing back from her, staying out of the way, _doing nothing._ But they were already home free, out of the battlecruiser and just waiting for Lance to get Blue and rendezvous. There was no alternative for him but open space.

It was an option that Keith didn't especially relish. So instead, he stood, slightly stooped so he didn't bang his head on the ceiling of the cockpit - somehow, despite Green and Red being about the same size and build, he couldn't stand fully straight inside Green without banging his head. It was a close thing, in Red, but he was careful, he could just _barely…_ almost stand straight.

Shiro was still quiet when he responded, sneaking around the other battlecruiser, but his voice was strained. He sounded how he'd sounded when Keith had gotten lost at the zoo as a child. " _No. I'm still looking. Did you locate him yet?"_

Maybe just a touch snappy. "No!" Pidge snapped back, tapping one of her screens with a little more force than was really warranted. "He's still below you. That's all I got."

" _Uh… g-guys?"_ came Hunk's voice; presumably, he was curled up in the Blue Lion awaiting her pilot. Keith couldn't imagine. " _It's… g-getting reall-ly c-cold in here."_ What? Hunk was supposed to be inside a Lion - they didn't get cold. Not on the inside. Not unless they were dead.

Keith opened his mouth to ask the obvious question, and he heard Pidge's sharp intake of breath, but Hunk let out a shrill cry of distress before either of them could speak. " _Ah- Shit! Guys! Sh-she's… I d-dunno, she's d-doing someth-thing! Sh-Shiro!"_ And Keith could hear it, in the background, crackling across their comms. A low sound, rushing, like a Lion's roar but somehow… different. Deeper. The grumble of the open desert before an earthquake.

"... What the hell?" It was muttered, to himself more than anyone, and Keith stepped forward to study the monitors over Pidge's shoulder. For once, she didn't snap at him to back off. "I don't get it, what could she be- uh… Pidge? Tell me you see that."

Pointing, to somewhere way down the far end of the cruiser, a tiny pinprick of… light? It looked… blue.

" _Ahhhhh!"_

They both flinched, Keith's hands twitching like he was going to hurl his helmet away, as the shrill wail blew across their radio. It was just for a moment, but it left Keith's ears ringing and a sharp pain building in his temples - rising with the sudden cold dread in his chest. "... Pidge… Was that…? Did that sound like…?"

Pidge met his gaze, amber eyes wide and glistening. "... That was Lance." Whispered, horrified, but with absolute confidence. Keith didn't question it.

"Shiro, what's happening down there?!" he shouted, looking away from Pidge and her wide, wide eyes. He didn't get an immediate response. Down to the far, far right, the tiny pinprick of light had gotten brighter, bigger. Something was happening to the ship, something… weird, and shining, and _spreading._ "Pidge… can you get closer? Take a look at that."

Without a word, Pidge shifted Green into gear and drifted in closer, moving around to get a proper look at the light. For a moment, as they approached, Keith doubted his own sight. This was a spacefaring ship, and battlecruiser big enough to house easily half a billion souls; it was designed to withstand space, the subzero temperatures that existed so far beyond the touch of sunlight. Frost forming on the outer hull of a ship was a disastrous event - and even then, the cruisers never breached atmosphere. Ice could only form if there was moisture.

But there it was, shining in the faint light from the cruiser and the Lion, slowly spreading to coat the ship from the glowing point of light outwards. Ice.

For another long moment, Keith and Pidge stared at each other. "... That's… not possible."

"Blue can make ice." Keith wasn't sure where it came from, the realisation, the fully composed sentence that he barely heard himself blurt out. But it struck him, and his heart lurched, and he felt Red's absence so keenly, a hollow in his mind like the embers of a bonfire. "Blue can make ice from… nothing."

Over the radio, Shiro gasped. " _From quintessence. No wonder I can feel the cold through my armour. If Blue's-"_

" _Uh, I hate to interrupt y-your theorycrafting, but Blue isn't doing this. I mean… I don't think she is. It's c-cold in here, but not that cold."_ Hunk. Hunk was inside Blue, so if it was the Lion, he should know. At least be able to tell.

" _Is she still active?"_

" _... Oh. Well, yeah - she's moving about a bit. Growling. But Lance is lost on this battleship, isn't that a normal resp-"_

Something exploded, a crackling roar, and then the radio went dead. A faint static buzzed across Keith's ears. "Shiro? Shiro! Hunk! Pidge, what the hell do we do?"

"I don't know!" she cried back, hands flying across her screens, all to no effect. In front of them, the ice had crept out beyond their sphere of vision, glistening - encasing the whole cruiser.

"... Pidge. I think we should move back." She looked up at him, confused - but Keith's eyes were locked on the Galra ship. The ice was starting to form out, tiny spikes that grew even as he watched. "Pidge!" Keith was jerked off his feet as Pidge finally responded, the Green Lion leaping backwards and then away from the battlecruiser. He didn't try to get up, was pretty sure he couldn't keep his footing, but he pushed himself up enough to look out, staring, horrified.

 _Shiro was in there. Lance was in there, Hunk was in there. The Blue Lion was in there._ And the ice had consumed the whole cruiser, spiking out, glittering, like a tiny frozen sun.

Then, quite suddenly, the ice stopped growing. For a moment there was nothing; absolute silence. Not even the static inside Keith's helmet. Slowly, Keith and Pidge looked at each other - Keith, sprawled out on the floor of Green's cockpit, Pidge twisted in her seat with both hands clenched painfully around the flightwheels.

There was a _crack_.

It whooshed out around them, emanating from the cruiser. Keith wasn't sure how they heard it. Sound didn't travel well (read: at all) in space, so they couldn't have heard it through the Lion; and Green wouldn't have detected the sound, wouldn't have transmitted it to the cockpit like it did with sound inside an atmosphere. It could have been their comms, because for all the silence and static, Keith had never switched his off - but the noise was too deep, too clear. It rumbled in Keith's chest, like the thud of heavy bass, something that made his heart stop and his body tremble.

Did they just _feel_ it? Was in it all in his mind anyway?

Pidge seemed just as shaken, turning her head back to look towards the cruiser, her body still twisted around, shoulders tipped sharply. _She's going to put her spine out of whack._ The thought was hysterical.

And then, almost in slow motion, the cruiser broke. Ice shot out through the hull - _from the inside_ \- in line with where the light had started, a monolithic sheet, jagged and gleaming. Silently _(sound didn't travel in space)_ the cruiser broke apart, the smaller part falling away from the rest and spinning slowly. Almost delicately. Like a ballet.

From her seat, Pidge let out a choked sound. "Hunk? Lance?" she managed, and then, in an even smaller voice, "Shiro?"

They got no response.

Something exploded in the side of the ship, shards of ice flew out everywhere, spiralling like tiny stars - Blue shot past, a wide streak of colour, from the main section of ship to the smaller. _Lance_. "Pidge, go!" Keith sounded rough even to himself, voice locked up in his throat, but it didn't matter. He felt sticky, sweat clinging to the bodysuit under his armour, and even as he finally tried to rise to his feet everything felt… wrong. Just a little off. Like his body wasn't entirely... his. The armour had never felt heavier.

But Pidge gunned it anyway, and they came to the small part of the ship just as they realised the ice was growing again. Pieces kept shearing through the hull, shattering the ship fragment from the inside out. Around them, scraps of metal floated in a cloud of debris, even as the lights kept flickering out.

Bodies, too. Discoloured and bloated and burst. Covered in frost. Keith tried desperately not to search them, not to look for Paladin armour. Somehow, the purple fur frozen into spikes and stained with blood and body juice didn't make him feel less sick.

"Wait- Keith. Keith! I see him!" Pidge veered sideways, and Keith saw the Blue Lion peeking through as the ice sheared out and broke apart itself, fragments glittering in between wreckage and corpses as if they could make this new graveyard beautiful. She hovered, still, nose down, jaw parted-

 _Lance_.

Lance floated, but Keith honestly wasn't sure how Pidge had spotted him so quickly. His armour was completely coated in ice, a thick shell that made him seem like a carving. A furious hope burned painfully in Keith's chest as they approached, took in the full reality of the sight: _Please let his helmet be closed._

The ice shell encased him entirely, and Keith couldn't help but picture what the inside might look like. Open helmet, ice pouring in through the gap - protecting Lance from space, but filling every crevice, burning skin and freezing blood, filling his mouth and nose and ears, filling his throat - his lungs - his skull. Ice, consuming everything until it wasn't Lance inside that armour anymore.

But the Blue Lion opened her mouth and caught Lance inside it, wide metal teeth clicking together and sealing. It was all they could do. Keith just had to hope.

He felt hollow. Hope was a lying bitch. _There was no way._

Without asking, and ignoring the shriek of protest, Keith leaned down over Pidge's seat and put a hand over one of hers, tugging the flightwheel back. Green turned sharply, their view spinning, until the rest of the ship came into view and Keith let go.

The rest of the ship was slowly drowning. Pieces broke off at random, ice spilling out and splitting away as it grew and grew. Sheets and spikes punctured the hull of the cruiser; it wasn't one large chunk anymore. It had already been torn into six. Even as Keith watched, those parts shuddered and sundered under the onslaught of ice. It just didn't stop.

For four minutes, Pidge and Keith just stayed as they were, transfixed, watching the cruiser shatter before their eyes. Galra bodies spewed out from every break - some bodies that were bigger or smaller and Keith didn't think were Galra at all.

The silence in the Green Lion's cockpit was so acute that Keith thought it might smother him. He had to repress the urge to close his helmet, just to make sure he could still breathe.

Eventually, Pidge spoke. Her voice was weak, a tiny whisper that scraped Keith's ears and made him want to scream until it went away. "... What the fuck, Keith?" And it rose in his throat, the snarl, the raging, clawing confusion and fear that made Keith want to snap, to let go, let instinct take over. But Pidge wasn't even looking at him, couldn't look away - she was _scared_.

Keith was scared too.

"... I don't know." Just as small, jagged and rough and _oh god_ he sounded just as afraid as she did, he couldn't even hide it. He couldn't even put together enough feeling to try.

But the battlecruiser was gone, and half a billion souls were gone with it, and all that was left was wreckage and scrap and ruptured bodies, and the ice glinted in the vacuum, floating and drifting and quietly shining, as if it were still beautiful, as if it weren't a nightmare. Keith felt cold. _Red. Red, please. Red._ But there was nothing, he was too far away, and the cold was in his mind as well, consuming, slivers of ice invading even his thoughts, breaking him apart like he was a Galra cruiser, and _there was nothing he could do and it was so cold and-_ -

Pidge touched him. He leapt, _clanged_ his head against the ceiling, and froze as the sound fractured the weird blanket of silence that had filled the air like cotton, suffocating. Keith met Pidge's eyes, and then suddenly she was hugging him, her helmet pressed awkwardly against the ridge of Keith's armour, her head turned sideways and out. For a moment, Keith felt the reflexive revulsion in his gut, the spinning need to _not_ be touched, to stop it - and instead he put his arms around her shoulders, pulled her closer. The twisty feeling faded into something… warmer. Weird, fluttery, but Pidge was his friend, she was a Paladin, she… understood him in a way that almost nobody did.

It wasn't enough to ease the shaking in his body.

" _Guys? I- Shiro, are you out there?"_ Hunk's voice flickered across the comms and they jumped, startled - but Pidge didn't let go. She turned her head, and Green spun slowly sideways until she faced Blue again. Keith was pretty sure Pidge wasn't even aware she'd done it.

For a second, there was nothing, and Keith stopped breathing. " _Y-yeah…. Yeah, I'm here."_ Voice jagged, sounding dazed, strained, maybe hurt… but he was alive. He was okay. " _Sorry about that, Hunk. I got blown into space when the ship broke. Must of passed out for a second there."_ With how fast Shiro would have been hurled into the vacuum, that made sense. Keith had passed out every time during explosive decompression training, back at the Garrison. He was pretty sure everyone had. Even without the decompression part, the force that must have been exerted on Shiro's body would have been enough.

Keith breathed again, and under his arms he felt Pidge's body relax. "Are you okay?" Keith said quietly, his voice still jagged, weak, uncontrolled. When Shiro responded, he still sounded dazed, but there was a warmth there that made Keith feel like melting. _He was okay._

" _Yeah, Keith. I'm alright. I'm gonna see if I can get to the Blue Lion, alright?"_ And the distant crackle of a jetpack firing over the radio. They watched, waiting, Keith forgetting that Pidge was hugging him; that he was hugging her back. For what felt like an eternity, they waited - until Shiro came into view. A little fleck of white and black against the void, bright flares of blue lighting up whenever he ignited his jetpack. It was in short bursts, just to change direction or boost momentum. Their jets were useful, and strong enough to lift three of them apiece - even more in space, where they were weightless - but they were still limited. Allura had spent three days dangling them from as high as she could with only enough jetfuel to burn one short ignition to make sure they got the point. Only burn what you had to.

"Okay. Okay, he's okay. We need to go - to get back to the Castle." Pidge was babbling, talking so fast Keith barely understood, but she let go and pulled away and slipped back into her seat, and Keith tried not to recognise that he suddenly felt alone.

He came closer anyway, hands gripping the back of her seat, and she didn't say a thing.

" _Yeah. Can you come give us a tow? I- Lance is out, h-he can't fly this thing."_ Hunk this time, even as Keith watched Blue scoop Shiro up into her mouth. _Lance_. But Keith still felt better, knowing Shiro was safe; Shiro could help Lance, Shiro would know what to do. He'd always known how to fix it.

"I'm on it." Pidge wasn't as careful as she normally was with Green, her movements sudden and jerky, but they got above Blue and Green's claws closed around her pridemate's shoulders. It was easy to drag them through space, where there was no atmosphere, no gravity. Mass meant practically nothing. "How's Lance doing?"

" _Not great,"_ Shiro said, voice clipped. He sounded better than he had before, despite that. " _The ice is melting pretty fast, which is good, but he's still too cold. I don't know what happened, but we should get him to the healing bay as quickly as possible."_

So quietly Keith almost couldn't hear over the accompanying radio crackle, Hunk: " _Please hurry, Pidge."_

...

…

...

In the end, it was Coran who explained. They'd all gathered around Lance, while he floated in a healing pod. His face twitched occasionally, hands half-clenching, but Keith had been reassured that was a good sign. He remembered Lance in the pods after Sendak's attack, how utterly still he'd been, how dead-looking. The twitching looked pained, but Keith had been reassured it was good. He believed it.

They'd gathered, silently, watching Lance start to heal. He'd been _freezing_ when they'd finally made it back, dropping Blue in the main hangar and landing as fast as possible. Keith had jumped out of Green before the Lion had stopped moving, ignoring the disbelieving shrieks that had followed him out.

Lance hadn't been covered in ice anymore, but he'd been soaking wet and utterly freezing and so, so pale. Blue lips. It had looked like he was crying, but his eyes were open slightly, unseeing. His pupils hadn't reacted to light when Keith had pulled the lids up - ignoring Hunk's panicky ' _Oh god, oh god, Keith stop it whatareyoudoingstopit'_ and Shiro's snapped orders. His armour had been hell to touch, but Keith had gotten onto Lance's other side and helped Shiro carry him back to the infirmary anyway.

His side and arm still burned numbly where the cold had leached through Keith's own armour. It had been so cold. _Colder than space,_ whispered the little voice of logic in the back of his head. _The cruiser froze on the outside._

Magic, magic. It had been magic. It _must_ have been magic. Blue could make ice out of quintessence, and there was no moisture on the cruiser to freeze. It had to be magic. Blue didn't need moisture, she just needed quintessence.

Blue could make ice out of magic. But Lance couldn't.

"... It's called coalescence."

Keith jumped, feeling Pidge jump too; she had kept close beside him, not quite touching. Shiro was on his other side, maintaining a steady presence, just… being there if Keith needed him. It was something he'd always done. In Keith's experience, that alone was enough - and Pidge stayed close, within arm's reach of Keith at all times. He wondered if he was providing the same for her.

As one, they all turned to face Coran. He was standing by the display panel, watching Lance's vital signs, making sure everything worked as it was meant to. Now, the deep amethyst of his eyes was fixed on Lance as well. He glanced around at them, ran his fingers through his mustache, and sighed quietly.

"What Lance did. What Blue did. It's called coalescence." Quietly, Coran came around and approached them, walking up close to the pod, keeping his eyes fixed on Lance. Did he not want to look at the rest of them? Was he just… that worried about Lance?

Maybe he couldn't bear to look them in the eyes.

"It's extremely dangerous, and it's not something I'd ever recommend any of you doing. Not ever, but _especially_ not now." Coran shifted his weight. "I'm sure by now that you've noticed your bond with your Lion is… soul-deep. A bond like it does not exist anywhere else in the known universe. When you see through your Lion's eyes, become one with their senses… you are mixing your quintessence with theirs. Think of it like… putting your soul into your Lion. Almost literally, in fact."

Pidge took Keith's hand. She didn't acknowledge it, didn't look up at him; Keith wasn't even sure she realised she'd done it. "But you got us to do that… like, right away. We can _all_ do that. Somebetterthanothers." Muttered, the last part, with a baleful glance at Keith and Shiro.

Coran nodded, sighing again, tugging on the end of his mustache. "Yes. That's not dangerous. You are Paladins - you're supposed to be one with your Lion. When you form Voltron, you _all_ become one, all ten of you. I'm sure you've felt that." The four Paladins looked at each other. Keith tried to ignore that - yes, he'd felt it. It was… weird to think about, afterwards, everything a bit fuzzy and surreal, but in the moment… yes, he could feel them. All of them. The touch of the other Lions was intense, but it also felt natural. The other Paladins… were stranger. He could feel them like a buzzing under his skin, when they became Voltron. He couldn't read their thoughts, it wasn't like that, but… he could _feel_ them.

As one, in silence, the four Paladins nodded.

"That's natural. As you progress, get stronger as a team and bond closer to your Lion, that will increase. The Paladins of old… they could sense each other's presence, if they were in danger, when they were distressed. It made…" And here Coran trailed off, something tight in his voice - something Keith didn't… recognise. It reminded him of the echo that sometimes came into Shiro's voice, when the nightmares got bad, when he was haunted beyond sleep. When he could barely function. Something so deep and painful that Keith couldn't understand, couldn't comprehend.

Coran shook himself, clasping his hands in front of him, and focused back up at Lance. "I'm sure that, by now, you've also noticed that your Lions can… share their quintessence with you as well." For a moment, Keith didn't understand. Red could do that?

She purred, in his mind, rubbing against his thoughts with the heat of a slumbering sun. Despite himself, Keith felt his muscles relaxing again.

"Is that… like, when we're training, and I'm pretty sure I need a stack of pancakes, in my mouth, _right now,_ or I'll drop dead, and then Yellow sort of… touches my mind and suddenly I feel better?" Hunk said, frowning slightly, head tilted. _Oh_. Yes, Keith understood. When he trained for hours after the rest of them had stopped, and all he wanted was to curl up in bed and try to sleep, and then there was Red and he was hot and _alive_ and needed to train some more, or see what Shiro was up to, or just wander the ship until he finished his mental map.

 _That's Red's quintessence?_

Grimly, Coran managed a smile. "Yes, that's it exactly. They don't give you very much - just a sliver, a drop. Your bodies are mortal, and by all accounts humans are weaker than most any sentient lifeform." All of them bristled, Shiro clenching both hands at Keith's side. Pidge's grip became painful, her fingers digging in - but Keith didn't try to dislodge her. He didn't really trust the little gremlin not to attack if he tried. Either him or Coran. Neither would work out great, right now. "Now- Relax, sorry, didn't mean it like that. But the Lions are… something else entirely, They aren't of this… _universe_. They're ancient, more powerful than anything you or I could otherwise imagine. They give you a little, just to help you out, but if they gave you too much then they could burn you out from the inside. Leave you dead, or helpless shells."

They all looked at Lance, hovering, cold - but alive.

"I don't know if it's happened yet - I'm sure you'd have asked if it had - but sometimes their quintessence triggers a… sort of elemental reaction. You know that each Lion is associated with an element?"

"Yep!"

"Yeah."

 _Uhh…. what?_ Keith looked at Pidge and Hunk in confusion, and then up at Shiro. Shiro met his gaze guiltily, licked his lips, and then tentatively: "Imagine that we don't."

Pidge groaned, and knocked her forehead against Keith's arm. "Am I the only one who does our damn homework?"

"Hey!" Keith broke in, defending Shiro before the man had to own up to not doing the readings. At least everyone _knew_ Keith and Lance never did them. "That's a crapload of reading, okay! And it's all in Altean!"

"Yeah, but dude. We gotta know it all - we're supposed to be saving the universe, man. How're we gonna do that if we don't know what we're saving?" Hunk asked, like it was the most reasonable question in the world. Keith shot him a look, trying to convey _very clearly_ that if Pidge wasn't still suctioned onto his arm and he didn't want to make a traumatic experience any worse for her, he would absolutely give Hunk a new trauma to work through. Judging by the raised eyebrows, it didn't work.

 _Fuck. How the hell does Shiro do it?_

Luckily, Allura broke in before anything else could be exchanged - but she was finally smiling, for the first time since they'd left for this mission. "Paladins, calm yourselves. I believe Coran was… in the middle of something."

Ah. Yeah. Keith was totally focused.

Smiling gratefully at her - but the expression didn't reach his eyes - Coran continued. "The Black Lion is the guardian of the skies; the Red Lion the guardian of flame; the Green Lion the guardian of the mighty forest-!"

"Oh my god! Is that why I smell like pine trees every time me and Green do anything?!" Pidge exclaimed, eyes wide.

Snickering, Keith nudged her. "Pidge. Paladin lecture," he muttered, trying to _focus_. It was bad. Lance was hurt. Just because he was healing didn't mean they could make light of a Paladin lect-

 _Oh god, they were going to have to relay all of this to him._ Keith silently decided to leave that job to Pidge and Hunk.

"Yes, _as_ I was saying: the Green Lion is the guardian of the forest; the Blue Lion the guardian of water; and the Yellow Lion is the guardian of land!" For a brief moment, Coran's gaze drifted, and he twirled his mustache, and then his expression seemed to somber again. Where did he go, Keith wondered, when his eyes drifted like that? "Anyway… Sometimes, when your Lion gives you some quintessence, it will be imbued with some of their elemental power. If it hasn't happened to you yet, you'll notice soon enough.

"But coalescence is different. It can be risky for your Lion to give you quintessence, but they know how much is safe for you. They just _know_. And that will slowly increase over time, and you'll learn to harness their power and use it with your own, and eventually you'll even learn to harness their elemental quintessence in tandem with your own power - usually, your bayard."

 _What._

"What?"

"WHAT?"

" _What the fuck that's so-"_

"Pidge. Language." And Pidge huffed, looking away from Shiro with a scowl. But she didn't move.

Coran cleared his throat, although he was obviously pleased by their reactions; a tiny twinkle was back in his eyes, despite his serious expression. "In due course, you Paladins will master all this. But what Lance did today… It's on a whole other level of power.

"A Lion is capable of _forcing_ their quintessence on you. If you argue with it in a combat situation, or it deems the danger too great… We call it coalescence. To put it simply… The Lion's quintessence overwhelms and consumes your own, and then it just keeps going until your body cannot contain it anymore. Based on what you've told me, and the recordings Pidge took… I believe that's what happened."

For a moment, Keith and Pidge just looked at each other.

" _Ice,"_ Pidge breathed, and Keith nodded.

"Ice."

Blue was the guardian of water, and the whole Galra cruiser had been consumed by ice.

"But Lance will be okay. He's healing right now." Shiro almost managed to keep his voice sounding neutral, but Keith wasn't fooled. He heard the tremor, the tiny faint fear that Lance wouldn't be okay. He would blame himself; Shiro was their leader. It wasn't his fault, but he still felt responsible.

And Coran just shrugged helplessly. "Coalescence can destroy the body, of course. Your frail mortal forms aren't designed to handle that much power - even Altean bodies would disintegrate if coalescence was maintained too long. And you lot haven't even started with elemental harnessing yet. Lance seems to have escaped that fate - but it was his quintessence that Blue damaged most. It's possible he might recover and be totally fine."

"But?" Allura voiced it. The doubt none of the Paladins could manage - the word they were all choking on.

And Coran sighed again, and studied Lance sadly. The twinkle was gone again. "If Blue held coalescence too long, if she did this too soon, if her bond to Lance wasn't deep enough… it's entirely possible Lance's quintessence has been damaged. His _soul._ If it has, there's nothing we can do about it. It may heal itself, in time… or with Blue's help. But it may be irreparable. He might suffer side effects that we won't notice for phoebs - even decaphoebs. There's just no way to know."

"... B-Blue wouldn't have done it if she didn't have to. Right? She'd never risk hurting Lance unless she _had_ to." Hunk's voice was quiet, shaky. Still choking on that _but_.

Coran looked over, and then he stepped in close and pulled Hunk into a hug. He rubbed his back. "I have no doubt of that, my boy. Your Lions may not think like we do, but you are their Paladins. They love you."

Keith was losing feeling in his hand. Instead of complain, he pulled Pidge in closer, tucked his arm around her shoulders. His fingers felt cold as bloodflow restarted. On his other side, Shiro put a hand on his shoulder, and Keith gave in, fell into the old familiar touch and comfort of the only man he thought he could ever trust. Shiro's waist was trimmer than before Kerberos, harder - his back was held stiffer. All the little changes that Keith couldn't help but document. But Shiro still stepped in, put an arm around Keith's shoulders, and gently rubbed one thumb behind his ear, right on his hairline.

It helped.


	2. Hunk, of Land

The first time Hunk did it, he saved all their lives.

* * *

"We gotta figure out how they keep making these things!" Hunk cried, voice rising slowly in pitch as he yelled, jerking the flightwheels and digging Yellow's claws into the ground, trying to get him steady. The other four Lions were in the air, weaving around the boulders sailing at them.

Yellow roared a challenge, and the robeast stopped its assault on their friends to focus its effort on Team Yellow. "Uh… Oh shit ohshit okay here we go~!" Hunk tightened his grip, reaching for Yellow Faithful in his mind, feeling the Lion reach back, until their bond opened wide enough to eclipse Hunk's senses. He could see the robeast barrelling towards them, everything tinged faintly yellow; god why did it have to have horns like that?

Sinking into the link, Hunk threw the flightwheels forward, pulling on Yellow's mind as if it were a cord, as if he were climbing. They swirled together, and Hunk felt their power bleed out and harden around them, a wide, heavy feeling, like wearing armour instead of skin.

Quintessence flashed into matter, and Yellow dug in his Big Claws™ as his body thickened, armour plating surrounding them. The robeast collided, a reckless charge, and Hunk felt Yellow roar back, digging his claws in, fighting back. Was Hunk yelling? Probably. It didn't seem to matter right at the moment.

The robeast had hammered through everything they'd been able to offer - Lions, asteroids, _everything_ on this planet once they'd landed. If ever Hunk believed in an unstoppable force, he'd just met it. But Yellow dug in, and they were resisting; there was ignition, Yellow's rear thrusters igniting. His hindquarters lifted off the surface of the planet, hind paws tucking up against his body, tail curled. The oddly red coloured earth _cracked_ under Yellow's front paws, the big claws sinking into it - blue fire shot out sideways as the armour thrusters ignited.

Hunk was bathed in green light, the blue fire filtering through the yellow interior of his cockpit, but he just pressed forward a little more - threw himself into his bond with Yellow, felt the strain of gears and fire and metal. The ground broke open under them, Yellow's head dropping further down below the robeast's centre of gravity, and-

 _Perfect._

Feeling the strain, jaws aching, Hunk had Yellow open wide and poured energy into the throat canon. The blue light intensified, overtook the yellow and the robeast's purple, and then Yellow Faithful fired.

They jerked back, the ground turning to powder under their paws, and the robeast lost traction, lifted, and flipped. Yellow released, the armour flashing back into energy, and they leapt backwards and out of the way, even as the robeast crashed into the ground.

" _Everyone fire!"_ Shiro's voice came through and four ionised beams of blue connected against the robeast's stomach. It was a charging monster, heavily armoured on all sides - except the under one. The stomach was its weak point. Leaping into the air, Hunk pulled back on Yellow's flightwheels, felt the energy build, and added his canon to the barrage.

The powder and caked flats gave, and for a moment the robeast was lost to them as dust and red clouds exploded into the air. They stopped their attack.

" _Did that do it?"_ Keith asked; hopeful, but doubtful. It would be too easy to win just like that. But still, they hoped.

" _I dunno… No- wait, I hear someth- Fuck, guys, up UP!"_ Lance broke off whatever gag he'd been about to pull, (however he'd been about to ease their nerves a little), and the Blue Lion shot up past them. Hunk looked down, even as wordless shouts filtered through the comms and Pidge shot upwards too.

The ground rumbled, and dust blew into the air in huge puffs, as if the land itself was smoking. A huge crack broke open across the plateau, followed by another - and another. Following his teammates, Hunk shop upwards into the sky, a blazing streak of colours.

Below them, a bone-shaking growl rippled out and the ground caved in along the cracks, dust erupting again. High in the atmosphere, the five of them waited, unable to see through it. Yellow rumbled in Hunk's mind; discontent, uncertainty. The Lion didn't know how to defeat this opponent. They couldn't exert more force without Voltron or without risk, but they couldn't simply weather the storm until something presented itself either. Forming Voltron might have given them the power boost they needed - but Hunk was pretty sure that presenting the weird minotaur-looking motherfucker with a massive, single target was _exactly_ what it wanted.

" _We should form Voltron,"_ came the inevitable, from Keith this time. " _We haven't even been able to scratch the thing. It's still coming at us."_ True enough - and as the dust started to dissipate, Hunk saw the wild, glowing eyes and the four massive horns that made up most of the robeast's bulk, attached to a head that was the same size again as its body. A third pair of horns, attached to the thing's hindquarters, gleamed menacingly.

 _Ugh._ God, it was creepy.

But… "I'm not sure, guys," he volunteered, waiting a moment to be shot down. It didn't happen. "... I mean, look at it. If we give it a single target…" Hunk didn't finish that sentence - his team weren't stupid. They'd understand that.

" _... I agree, but we might not have a choice,"_ Pidge said. Softly, like she was reluctant, but Green drifted closer to the Black Lion anyway, getting into position. " _We just don't have the power to take that thing out without it."_

" _Hey! If Hunk says we shouldn't, then I'm on board with that!"_ Lance, shot across the comms sharply, while Blue growled quietly and moved a little closer to Yellow. " _Yellow's the only Lion who can take a hit from that thing to begin with! If he says we shouldn't give it a bigger thing to headbutt, then he's right."_ It was… warm, knowing Lance trusted him so much. Despite himself, Hunk smiled.

Yellow growled a warning in his mind, and Hunk swerved sideways without thinking, yanking a little harder on the flightwheels than he otherwise would. A boulder sailed through the air where he'd been. "Oh- come on! Already?!"

And they had to refocus.

It was about the time that Hunk bodyblocked a boulder from ripping through Green that Shiro made the call. Pidge was distracted, hot blue pouring from Green's mouth, while she tried to break the ground around the robeast enough to maybe bury it, and even if Hunk had shouted, she wasn't Red, she wasn't fast enough. The rock shattered against Yellow's body, and pain sparked in Hunk's side, bleeding through their bond. He cried out.

" _Hunk? Oh fuck- We're getting wrecked out here!"_ Pidge shouted, breaking off her attack and swerving around, even as Hunk dropped like a- _oh come on-_ like- fuck it- like a fucking rock. Another boulder sailed by where the two Lions had been a moment later.

" _Hunk, I hear your concern, but form Voltron! We need the power!"_

Always the diplomat. Hunk didn't feel good, as he swung into line and opened his mind to Yellow again, let himself drop into it; he felt uneasy. It made their link tremble, but it was still warm and solid inside him, a huge barren vastness that was just Hunk and Yellow Faithful and nothing else. But he didn't hesitate, and he didn't resent the order. Shiro had heard his protest, but Shiro was the leader for a reason - and even if he sometimes made mistakes, Hunk trusted him.

And he couldn't argue with it. They needed the power; they hadn't hurt the thing at all.

There was a protracted moment, as they fell into line, and for a moment Hunk had the strange sensation of being _squeezed_ from the inside. Yellow reached for his pridemates, expanding their minds, making a link - and then it all rushed in, and Hunk felt his heart start to flutter and race, even as his breathing slowed, even as he felt the rush of air sync up with the other Paladins.

For a second, there was nothing but that feeling. Yellow encompassing his mind like a shield, while Hunk spread and melted into him, just another one of the Lion's senses. The other four Lions touched, licked at the edges - the rushing wind, that was Black, surrounding them, holding them together, catching anyone who even came close to slipping away. Inside them, filling them, the cold touch of ice - that was Blue, swirling throughout their bond, sharpening them, cleansing their doubt. Green was a gentle caress across their skin, if they could have skin in their minds - soft and sweet and encouraging, urging them forward, reminding them of their own strength. And roaring above them, scorching and screaming and defiant - that was Red, like the sun had descended into their thoughts, fierce and loud, a constant reminder of everything that rode on them, everyone who depended on them. Yellow filled Hunk's thoughts, an endless expanse - warm, infinite, a solid, steady foundation.

And the other Paladins, like static in Hunk's senses. The racing heart, thrumming against his chest like a hummingbird - that was Keith. Hunk's heart rate had risen to match it, reverberating across their strange bond. He could feel it, bouncing between the five of them, reflected back until they were in sync. Shiro lent them steadiness, the slow breathing that measured the fight in ten second intervals - five seconds in, five seconds out. Controlled, focused, unshakeable. From Lance came… it was hard to say _sight_ , because Hunk couldn't see through his eyes - nor Blue's - the way he could see through Yellow's, but perhaps _clarity_ would be sufficient. Clarity of battle; Hunk looked out upon their foe and saw it in a whole new way, saw where it bent or swayed, could almost see where it would be. Pidge gave them speed, thoughts streaming past like light - from what he saw from Lance, Hunk found himself cataloguing and compartmentalising, sorting away the useful from the interesting.

He couldn't hear their thoughts, not like he could with Yellow, but he could _feel_ them, humming and buzzing under his skin, like a loving touch where the body was numb. Distant and intimate at the same time.

And sometimes - just sometimes - he could feel their intentions.

"Keith- No-!" But he was too late. Keith slammed his bayard into the Red Lion's jack, and the sword formed in Red's mouth, held out by Voltron's right hand.

 _Goddamn it._ Just because they were linked didn't mean they reached the same conclusions.

Briefly, Hunk thought that it would work despite his reservations. The minotaur robeast locked its horns into the earth and dug up a massive chunk of rock, before aiming and hurling at them once again. Even as it did, it was tilting the other way, almost sitting down, digging up another chunk with the horns on his butt. _Whoever designs these things is hacking my nightmares_.

Hunk shivered, felt it flow across the link, felt them all reflect it. Great, now they were _all_ creeped out. Oh well, nothing for it.

Keith swung the sword forward, while the rest of them rotated around the movement, and slashed that boulder in half. It shattered, spraying Voltron with dozens of harmless pebbles. Hunk used the term 'pebbles' loosely - any one of them was probably big enough to kill a human, still.

Watching the robeast, they all saw the second boulder flying for them, felt the sword barely stopping its descent, and swung around into action, rotating around the Green Lion this time. Voltron's left hand twisted up, and Black's wings unlocked and flew together, bound to the baseplate - the second boulder smashed against the shield and shattered too. The impact did them no harm, but Voltron flew back and dipped lower to the ground.

" _We're at a disadvantage in melee, we need to get our guns going and blast the fucker!"_ Pidge yelled, braced, thoughts racing, _racing_ , searching what she could see, searching what Lance was showing her.

They breathed in steadily, following Shiro's rhythm, focused on defeating their foe.

" _That won't work,"_ Keith argued, even as they twisted and circled the robeast, ducking a boulder and catching another against their shield. The robeast could only deliver that attack in bursts of two. It was something Hunk had noticed before, but he hadn't really _noticed_ it. " _We've tried using our energy weapons, we hit the thing in its weak spot with all five at once, and it didn't do a damn thing. We can't hurt it with energy blasts."_

Another good point. Hunk held his tongue, focusing on tracking the robeast and keeping Voltron out of harm's way, letting Shiro's breaths steady him, letting Keith's heartbeat urge him on, keep him on the edge of his reflexes. He was watching, waiting for anything that might give them the answer - but right now, he didn't have it. So he let them try to figure it out.

" _We can't risk getting close, either. I don't want to find out what those horns could do to us."_ Shiro, his voice lower and calmer than the others. But he didn't offer them a solution - and they kept flying circles, dodging and weaving, occasionally slashing boulders out of the air.

Lance was focusing as well, watching the robeast. " _We can't just keep avoiding it forever, what if we just piss it off more? We haven't seen it do anything except throw rocks and bash through everything we throw at it!"_

In Hunk's mind, Yellow _growled_. It rumbled through him, like an earthquake, shuddering and violent - and in a flash, Hunk _knew_. "Hold up- Guys, my Lion just-"

" _We felt it!"_ Pidge cut across him, a strange mix of impatience and awe in her voice. " _Do it!"_

Well, technically Shiro was supposed to give that order - but no protest came, and Hunk knew that she was right anyway. "Keith, put the sword away. Pidge, put the shield back on Voltron's back. We gotta land." The words spilled out, faster than Hunk ever spoke, _racing_ , overflowing. He was barely aware of what they meant, just knew what he needed - Yellow vibrated in his mind, in his whole body, a thundering, tumultuous snarl.

There was a flicker of hesitation, when Voltron spun and nearly tipped, because Hunk stopped dead and the others kept going. But whatever it was they felt from him, whatever it was he gave the team, they focused and breathed and _knew_ that they had to follow suit. The sword dissipated into energy, and the wings locked back into place on Voltron's back. With a _thud_ that might have shook the whole planet, Voltron landed.

And dug its feet in. Hunk let out a sound that was almost pained, as he reached and grabbed and _dragged_ on Yellow's mind, on his quintessence. Yellow gave it freely, let it flow out through their link into the others, through all the Lions, into Voltron itself.

Four voices sounded in Hunk's ears, four dissonant gasps and whimpers as they felt Yellow's soul brush past theirs.

The quintessence shimmered, expanding and spiralling out like a sandstorm. The five of them felt, rather than saw, the energy condense and fuse into matter. Lance gasped again, in tandem with Hunk, as they felt their Lions shift and open slightly - where normally they had teeth, locked behind sealed jaws while they operated as feet, the Lions' heads turned and their jaws parted, wide arcs of metal punching into the ground. Voltron itself lifted slightly and then settled, locked into place, its balance ever so slightly weighted forward. The plate on Green's back shimmered and expanded, thickening and widening until it was so heavy Voltron rested the bottom on the ground. Its body was turned, leaning forward on the shield, making Green a weightbearing Lion alongside Yellow and Blue, while Red was held out behind.

Red's jaws expanded, almost doubled in size, and four long blades shot out, turned and inverted, locked onto her teeth. A layer of armour folded up around the Black Lion, covering her chest in a thin coat and thickening out over her back, flaring out into a new set of twin thrusters.

And Hunk was lost to it, thoughtless, nothing but the pulse of quintessence and the touch of nine other souls. Slowly, so slowly, his senses started working again, his neurons firing, but still - it was a swirl.

" _Holy shit, Hunk."_ Lance, breathless, awe in his voice. " _How the fuck did you- I felt Yellow- We're a fucking fortress!"_ And he whooped, delighted, and it rippled through the bond, resonated deep inside the Yellow Lion, and rebounded to Hunk.

He grinned. He couldn't help it. Yellow was _everywhere_ , a solid steady mountain, and Voltron was heavy and grounded and _protected_. The shield was wide enough to cover them almost entirely, and Voltron's feet held fast in the ground, dug in like Yellow's Big Claws™ but deeper - stronger.

Shiro just breathed, an eight second rhythm now, four in, four out.

Keith let out a laugh, in tandem with Pidge, and as one they all braced. A boulder shattered against the shield, followed by a second - and they barely trembled. Finally, even Shiro let out a wicked chuckle. " _I admit it. This is cool."_

" _Heck fucking yeah, this is c-"_

" _It's charging!"_

The robeast had lined them up, apparently decided hurling boulders would do nothing. It tossed its horns, bucked once, and then it was careening at them with as much speed and force as its awkward bulk could manage. The thing wasn't fast, not by any means. It practically lumbered towards them, movements odd and constricted, barely holding its head steady when it might even be heavier than its body.

But Hunk had felt it hit once already. The robeast collided with Voltron's shield, and the impact shuddered through them all - a spark of pain shot across their link. Tiny enough not to worry about, but there and sharp all the same. " _Ow- fuck! I bit my tongue!"_ Pidge shrieked, and then she snarled down at the minotaur as it bounced back.

Hunk and Lance took Voltron's weight, the thrusters in Voltron's left arm fired off, and the shield lifted. The robeast flew backwards, thrown back by the force of its own charge and Pidge's quick thinking. It sailed through the air not unlike one of its boulders, little legs flailing wildly, belly exposed. " _Keith, now!"_

Hunk wasn't even sure who yelled it. It might have been all of them. But they pivoted, Blue letting go of the earth, the unnaturally wide teeth slipping through as they lost all traction, and Keith slashed at the robeast with all the force Voltron could muster, jets of blue shooting off from its right arm and body and wings.

A filthy purple light shone from the cracks as the blades made contact. Tiny, just a glimpse - but they'd scratched it.

" _Fuck yes!"_ Keith crowed, even as the robeast slammed into the ground and sent up a cloud of dust again, even as the _cracks_ echoed around them from the planet's crust breaking open. " _Take that you piece of shit!"_

Hunk's heart was beating so fast he might have been worried, if he weren't so elated. They were breathing faster, three in, three out, focused, desperate - hungry for blood. That one was all Shiro - it was always Shiro. It would bother him, later, but right now Hunk was lost in the beat of it. The robeast was trying to kill them, was a threat to the neighbouring colonies. It had to die.

The dust started to settle, and Hunk could pick out the robeast's outline again. It's eyes glowed through the haze. _They hadn't been that colour before._ It was Lance, he was sure, that noticed that, but they all saw it. Whereas before the robeast's eyes had been a dull purple-blue, now they shone a blazing deep violet, tinged with red.

The earth shook, quite suddenly.

" _Brace!"_ Shiro shouted, and Lance secured himself in the earth again, Pidge set the shield down - hard, hard enough to let the point dig into the ground. Keith held back, behind the shield, just behind Voltron's body, waiting for the right time to strike again. They'd scratched it, they just needed…

...to…

 _Oh,_ _ **quiznak.**_

The robeast's eyes glowed, blazing and violent, and the light speared out, saturating its horns in stripes and patterns that reminded Hunk of- Shiro's arm. Probably best not to share that thought. It let out a clamouring roar, stomping the ground, bucking, slamming its… uh, hooves? Feet? Paws? Hunk couldn't really tell. But the robeast slammed them down anyway, the purple light flickering out until the horns glowed solid, all six of them.

The air itself almost seemed to vibrate around those horns. Hunk could almost imagine that he could hear it - the faintest buzzing, like a distant neon light on the fritz. The robeast lowered its head.

" _Ready? When it hits, fire all our thrusters. Don't let this thing move us!"_ Shiro's voice was iron, whipping through their comms as the wind inside their minds picked up the pace, howling. Almost a solid presence, sweeping through doubt and protest until they had none left. They'd been given an order. They would follow through.

The robeast charged them.

Fire ignited inside them as it made contact, wing and body thrusters erupting into flame, upper legs and both arms following suit. On Voltron's back, where Hunk and Yellow's armour had spread, the massive pair of twin thrusters ignited and sent out sheets of propulsion fire so dense it was almost white.

A shockwave exploded from the collision, and Hunk felt the shield _crack_. Pain bubbled through their bond like blood in their throat, and they were breathing _fast_ now, their hearts fit to burst from their chests - Voltron groaned under the strain, the ground under their feet starting to crumble.

Another _crack_ rocked them, shuddered in the air, and was immediately followed by a third. For a single, shining moment, Hunk felt victory rise up in his chest like an air bubble - the robeast's horns fractured, darkness showing through the glow, and then broke off and fell, turning shiny black as they did, losing power. They made tiny puffs as they hit the ground, and otherwise lay dead.

And then the second set of horns, still abright, crashed into their shield and their victory shattered. The shield broke apart, flew in all directions, and the robeast made contact with Voltron's left arm - with Green.

Over the radio, and somewhere deep inside them, Pidge _screamed_ , and then was silent.

A split second later, the pain rocketed across the bond and they lost their senses - something shook, and then it was all bright purple and everything hurt, and-

In a shower of sparks and light, as matter exploded back into quintessence and then shot away like fireworks, Voltron broke apart. The Green Lion hit the ground first, and didn't go far, a dead weight already. The Red Lion hurtled backwards, arced over the horizon, was gone. The Black Lion shrilled her protest, but she slammed down into the earth and skidded, leaving gouges and scratches and shattered rocks in her wake. Dust clouds billowed up around her.

The Blue Lion was torn out of the ground, twisted, and landed square on her shoulder - frantically turning even when her Paladin was barely conscious, even when all she could feel was the recoil, trying desperately not to land on her head and risk killing Lance.

And the Yellow Lion was flattened to the earth, wrenched back and ripped from its grip until it almost seemed knotted, limbs in all directions, head turned up. The robeast stood upon it, triumphant, its remaining four horns glowing.

But Hunk didn't see that. He didn't see or feel Yellow _thud_ into the ground with all the force the minotaur could muster, he didn't even see the other Lions strewn about. Hunk didn't see anything.

Voltron had broken apart, their bond _snapped_ , the glorious outflow of quintessence as Yellow moulded Voltron and held them steady suddenly cut off. Hunk was open wide to his Lion, the damage too sudden to hold back. It wasn't intentional - but it happened in a second. The other Lions were gone, the other Paladins disconnected, and their power was already flowing between them, their minds almost one. Yellow had no control - and Hunk had no defence.

With suddenly nowhere else to go, Yellow quintessence spilled over and backflowed. It poured into Hunk, jagged and painful, endless, blinding. It was like dry-drowning - it was like swallowing a thousand shards of glass, like drinking mud until it bled out of his eyes.

Hunk might have screamed. He might have been silent. He couldn't tell. He didn't _care_. Quintessence built inside him, scorching, scouring, an abrasion that pressed against his soul until- until maybe there was nothing left but dust. He felt raw, caught naked in a sandstorm, skin and body and thoughts ground clean off until he was chafing bone and dead earth. The desert itself was inside him, spreading, consuming everything. It was hot - it was _sweltering_.

Blindly, his eyes lit up and turned gold until the colour eclipsed everything. Sweat turned to salt turned to glass, glinting, cutting, bleeding him. The whole world turned to glass. Hunk felt he too was made of glass; sand compressed and boiled and shown no mercy.

But Yellow couldn't stop it, had shared too much of his power with Voltron, was bleeding quintessence into their bond. And Hunk couldn't stop it, couldn't redirect it, couldn't dig his way out. He was drowning in land, breathing quicksand.

Hunk jerked, and they quaked, and then the planet beneath them tore asunder.

* * *

The first thing Lance was aware of was the scream.

It was followed by an overwhelming grief, so strong he sobbed, heedless of who might hear him. He just felt so _empty_. Blue was there, a distant shimmer in his mind, but she was tiny in the aftermath of what they'd lost. She huddled in his thoughts, quivering, clinging - she felt the loss as keenly as he did, the sudden empty nothing that engulfed them.

Yellow, his soul like warm packed sand on all sides, was gone. The other Lions - flickers of sensation and emotion - were gone. He couldn't feel Shiro's breathing, his own was jagged and weak and… wet. Wrong, somehow. His heart thudded spasmodically in his chest, uneven, heavy, but slower than it had been before. His brain felt fuzzy, slow. He felt unsteady, like he was on a boat, solid ground lost to him, like he might fall over at any moment.

When he came to enough to see again, he realised that he was upside down. Most of his weight was braced on his shoulder, his back arched forward over his own head, twisted painfully to the side. His knees were barely an inch away from his nose, his feet brushing against the seam where Blue's viewscreen met the ceiling of her cockpit.

Spiderweb cracks shone across his visor, splitting the upside down image apart. Trying to process it made his head spin.

And the _scream_. It had stopped, but it still rang in Lance's ears, a low echoing sound frayed apart by the radio. _Hunk_. He knew what his best friend sounded like when he screamed. Slowly, Lance tried to turn his body around, falling bonelessly to the side. One of Blue's flightwheels dug into his side, and his weight shoved it back (forward?), but Blue only whirred in response.

Pain flared up in his mind, and Blue gave him what might have been a whimper, if whimpers could be mind-touches. It felt warm - compared to her normal touch. Some part of Lance recoiled.

"Blue?" he croaked, wriggling painfully to get off the flightwheel, tipping himself backwards and finally succeeding in sprawling out on the ceiling, limbs askew. The pain in his side didn't abate, sharp and punishing. Vaguely, Lance wondered how hurt he was. "Blue, are you-" and something wet caught in his throat and he exploded into coughing. Each tremor sent agony through his side, shuddering into his spine and up across his shoulders.

In the dim light, though, Lance didn't see any blood. So maybe his lungs weren't filled with blood. He didn't feel the telltale weight and gurgle of liquid, so… hopefully.

" _Lance?"_ came the crackle over the radio, a little unsteady, the signal flickering slightly. Was it distance? The damage to Blue? Maybe it was just the damage to his helmet. _Please let Blue be okay._

But he drew in a shaky breath and responded. "Shiro? What- What happened?"

" _I… I'm not sure, I'll be right there, okay? Just hold tight, L-"_

The whole world _shook_. The tremor was so sudden and violent that Lance cracked his helmet against the ceiling again, the spiderweb cracks reaching across to the other side. Shiro's voice was lost to the thundering rumble, like the sound of an approaching earthquake magnified - like bass that drowned out even one's own thoughts.

Something in that thunder broke, and _moved_ , and Blue rolled. The quivering touch gripped Lance's mind again - Blue's _fear_ \- and suddenly he felt like he was drowning in it. She was still rolling, hadn't quite come to a stop yet, but Lance could see dizzily out of her eyes, saw the robeast and Yellow and-

They stopped, as suddenly as it had started, and vertigo bloomed in Lance's stomach as the world fell away. It was nothing like taking off with Blue, like his Lion rocketing up through the atmosphere or dancing around weaponfire. She clung in his mind, a lukewarm tidal pool, but still they rose into the air - feeling unbalanced, precarious. Lance felt like he was swaying.

A shallow bowl of earth supported Blue's body, cradling her even as it rose. By the time they stopped, everything was swirling and Lance dragged at his helmet, clawing, barely managing to release the catches under his jaw and toss it aside before he puked. Guilt struck him, somewhere, but he couldn't even see straight and Blue just curled around his thoughts, gentling, turning soft. She felt a little cooler than before - it soothed him.

"Sorry, Blue," Lance choked out, even as he moved away and towards the hatch that led to Blue's mouth. She purred softly in his mind - weaker than usual, the interior lighting still dim, most of her systems still offline - but it settled Lance's stomach, and he tried to blink away the phantom lights. Mostly, it worked. "I'm getting out, okay?" And he was halfway to crawling out through Blue's mouth before he stopped. "Uh… Blue? Can I breathe out there?"

There was a low rumble, and then Blue touched something sweet and cold to Lance's thoughts. He smiled, without thinking, even though the world was still shaking and the thundering hadn't stopped. _She's okay._ "Thanks, Blue." He climbed out of her mouth, holding on to keep his footing, and paused when he got out. The air was thick and heavy and hot, and Lance felt the unpleasant cling of his bodysuit as he sweated through it, but as long as he breathed shallow breaths he didn't feel too dizzy.

The rocking earth probably didn't help that.

Pressing a kiss to Blue's nose, Lance let the coolness in his mind surround him. "Love you too, beautiful," he murmured to her, and then he dropped from her lip to the sandy bowl cradling her body. On all fours, trying to ride the rollercoaster, Lance crawled along towards the edge. It was so loud out here, the crashing, the constant crack and rumble of… of… whatever was happening. Lance didn't know.

He wished he'd brought his helmet with him now. It might have helped dim the booming noise. Nevertheless, Lance made it to the edge, fingers digging into the packed earth as hard as he could manage, and he looked out.

The first thing he saw were the other pillars. Three of them, rising above the surface of the planet, huge edifices that spiralled out of the earth like a reverse whirlpool made solid. The top of each pillar had blossomed into a wide, shallow bowl - just like the one upon which Blue sat. And gracing each of those bowls was another Lion.

In the distance, just barely visible even to Lance's sniper gaze, Red glinted. She was flaring blue light, thrusters screaming for release - and held down. Thick ropes of earth had wrapped around her legs, all four of them, holding her down. Something in Lance's chest felt numb at the sight. The Lion's weren't supposed to be caged - what could even hold one down like, _mere dirt_ , locking Red down. Even as Lance watched, a stream of blistering lava and plasma burst from her throat. If he focused hard enough, he could imagine he could hear her roar over the sound of crashing land.

Closer, the Black Lion stood atop her pillar, eyes lit but otherwise still. _Shiro._ Guilt dropped away in Lance's gut again as he realised that without his helmet, he couldn't communicate. Oh god, Shiro probably thought something had happened to him. Silently, Lance made a note to apologise later.

Even closer than that, too close, almost enough that Lance was tempted to leap across using his jetpack, was Green. She was absolutely still, eyes dead, sprawled unnaturally. The baseplate of Voltron's shield, usually stuck fast to her back, was dented and skewed.

Fear was a lump in Lance's throat, worsening the faint nausea. Pidge was in there. Pidge was in there, and _god she'd screamed and how could she be okay after-_

After.

And there, far below, glinting and glowing with a deep golden light, was the Yellow Lion. He was… not off the ground, precisely; spiking up around him, scraping close enough to raise him, jagged spikes of red stone so dark Lance wondered - for a split second - if it was bleeding. And inside him, Hunk was-

 _He'd screamed._

Around him, the earth was _churning_ , rocking and quaking and moving, huge broken slabs rising and tipping and rolling before disappearing back under the sand. It was that odd, dark red hue, so much that Lance was reminded of a heart, thundering and convulsing, and amidst it all the Yellow Lion shone and glowed and… The light almost seemed to spiral out, into the planet's surface.

Something purple glinted, and Lance caught a glimpse of the robeast, horns aglow. He had to resist the urge to vomit again. It was writhing, thrashing in the hungry earth - but to no avail. Deep, sick violet glowed out from the cracks in its stomach, and-

Were they bigger than when Keith had struck them? Even in motion and blurry for it… yeah. Lance was pretty sure than they were.

Blue whispered in his mind, wordless, the tide slowly starting to come back. It tugged him back, away from the edge - away from Yellow. Lance resisted. It burned in his chest, denying her, and doubly so because all he wanted was to go back and curl up and let her protect him. A robeast was always a scary affair, but it was better with the other four, with his space family around him, supporting him. As Voltron, he wasn't alone - there wasn't any room left for loneliness. It was him and them and the Lions and something unquantifiable, something that exceeded them all.

But he resisted, because Hunk was down there and whatever was happening, he was suffering.

And then, just as suddenly, the planet went still. Down below, the earth stopped churning, Yellow shining in the blood red rock teeth, and the sand fell flat in a second. Shards of stone protruded everywhere, like glass, like iron sand too close to a magnet. Half buried, glowing, the robeast struggled. Lance could only see horns, blazing purple through the destruction. He didn't know if it was because the other two were hidden, or if they'd been broken off.

In the stark silence, the robeast's distance rumbles were barely audible. It seemed to be struggling, to no avail at all. Yellow was still glowing.

 _Wait._ The rumbles were getting louder. Sand began to shake over the edge of Lance's safety bowl, trembling - it wasn't his body shaking, it was the ground. _Is it still the ground if it's this high in the air?_ Slowly, the rumbling began to turn to a distant roar, and then not so distant.

The shaking worsened, turning back into a full scale earthquake, shuddering and bucking and there was a brief moment when Lance looked over again, watching the red spikes holding Yellow up grow and lift him higher and dig into his side, and then his stomach flipped. It took a second for him to realise that it was literal, and then he was in the air, and his fingers scrabbled and slipped and he felt his fingernails break against the abrasion - he was flailing, drawing in the heavy, thick air to scream, watching everything tilt upside down. Almost gracefully.

And there was a low snarl and a whiplash of ice in his mind and a flicker of blue and-

 _Oh god-_

Blue's jaws snapped shut around him. Her front claws were dug into the edge of the earthen bowl, clinging, as hard as she could - but Lance sank into her, opening himself to her as far as he could, feeling her senses surge through him.

Her hind legs were caught in rock, like Red's were, keeping her held fast to the pillar. In some way, Lance was grateful - she couldn't have held on without it, and they would have tumbled over. Maybe she could have caught them, but she was still weak, energy bleeding out of her with every movement, and maybe she couldn't have. She kept her jaws clamped shut, unwilling to risk Lance slipping out through her teeth, her head hanging clean off the edge - and below them, Lance could see, the world tinged with blue - they could see.

The roaring of the earth was deafening, an all-encompassing concussion that tossed them about as if they were playthings. Inside Blue's mouth, Lance's body was hurled against the metal walls, even as Blue's head was jerked from side to side, even as they tried to focus on the sight below them.

And the whole world _cracked_. In a line that opened under Yellow and the robeast, a line that shot outwards over the horizon faster then Lance could follow, further, spreading across the planet's surface until Blue couldn't see it anymore, until they thought it might have split the whole thing in half. The halves pulled apart, deeper, thundering, into an abyss that stretched and widened and fell infinitely - until a dull glow burst forth from inside it. Something pale and yellow and molten, something… that should never have seen the light of day.

The spires holding Yellow shot down into the canyon - _canyon?_ Lance was pretty sure the whole planet had been torn in half - and stuck, and the Lion didn't sway. He simply lay still and glowed so fiercely even Blue couldn't bear to look directly at him. Lance tugged on her mind, begging her to stop trying - it hurt him too, awash in her senses, staring horrified through her eyes.

But the rocks surrounding the robeast - the rocks that had pierced it - melted into dust in seconds. Thrashing its stumpy, hideously twisted legs, only two horns still attached (and the one on his flank just barely), the minotaur _fell_.

It seemed to go on forever. Lance didn't want to think about how long it would take for the robeast to touch the molten core - if it was indeed the core - but Blue knew, and the knowledge filtered into him anyway. And it stayed open, the robeast's form dwindling, the seconds dragging into a minute, two minutes, th-

The minotaur hit the core. A flash of light, sick purple and butter yellow, shone out of the canyon in a blinding sheet, almost as if it were a physical thing. Blue flinched back from it.

And they shook, and the agonising crashing thundered around them, and all at once the whole world clashed back together. Blue lost her grip on the earth bowl and slammed down, her chest hitting the edge, body pulled taut as the rock holding her hindlegs fast didn't give an inch. Pain flashed through them, and Lance moaned, feeling tears in his human eyes.

A yellow light, deeper than the light of before, dimmer, sweeter - like starlight made tangible - shot across the canyon, spread from the Yellow Lion in both directions until it vanished over the horizon, and the massive crack in the planet sealed.

The dust settled, the spires holding Yellow up crumbled and the Lion touched the ground, the pillars remained. The rock holding Blue in place fell away, dissolving into nothing, and her butt slumped to the ground, tail caught beneath one leg as they splayed sideways - she didn't fall forward, counterbalanced. In the distance, Lance saw Red shoot into the air and hurtle towards them.

The world quieted.

The light dimmed.

And the robeast was just… gone.

Lance surrendered back to his own body, pulling away from Blue's senses, and found himself shivering, crying, eyes wide, heart racing. Sealed inside Blue, the air felt slippery after the atmosphere outside, almost wet - too hard to grasp, too light inside his lungs. Dizzily, Lance crawled back towards Blue's throat, where the base of her mouth canon was tilted up to allow him free access to her cockpit.

The smell of bile greeted him, and he gagged softly; right. He'd forgotten. "Sorry, Blue," he murmured, slipping back into the cockpit anyway. She purred low in his mind - reassuring, forgiving. It wasn't his fault. _Except it kinda was._ But he didn't argue with her; he wouldn't win.

The vomit had splattered when Blue turned right way up - _to catch me_ \- and it still dripped from the ceiling a little, but luckily it was most of the way to the right. Lance avoided it with as wide a berth as possible, looking for his helmet.

Faint sound, buzzing voices, led him to it where it had fallen, lost in one of the many crevices. It was mostly clean, so Lance rubbed a thumb over the cracked visor, eyes misty. The voices coalesced into words.

" _... e fucking same, I'm telling you, it was-"_

" _Doesn't matter! Get Pidge, I'll get Hunk, we can come back for Lance. He responded before, and we can't take them both, just do it!"_

Shiro never shouted like that. He must be terrified. Lance turned his mic on and intoned, "Shiro, I'm okay."

" _Lance! Thank god-"_

" _What the fuck, Lance?!"_ Keith was shouting still, his voice strained and… almost hysterical. " _Don't go fucking AWOL, are you fucking kidding me, what the fuck is wr-"_

Shiro's voice was sharp when it cut across, suddenly iron. " _Keith. Save it for later. Lance, can Blue fly?"_

Silently, Lance relayed the question, even though Blue would have heard it. A flicker across their link, just to confirm what her lit up interior told him. "Yeah. She's not in great shape, but we can make it back to the Castle."

There was a sharp _whoosh_ \- a sigh. It was relieved. " _Okay, good. I'll get the Yellow Lion, and Keith, you get the Green. We'll get everyone home_ _ **first,**_ _okay?"_ There was something in his voice that made Lance think Keith had been arguing.

Yeah, that made sense.

"Shiro…" Lance's voice was shaky, but he couldn't control it. Even the gentle tendril of ice weaving through his thoughts couldn't help it. His chest felt tight, and even if Blue was helping him not to think, it couldn't stop the fear knotting in his throat. _Hunk was down there. Inside Yellow._ And Lance had never seen _anything_ like what he'd just witnessed.

The whole planet had broken apart. If not, the exaggeration felt deserved. Lance was overwhelmed, drained; his limbs felt numb, even as he stood - stooped - in Blue's cockpit and held his helmet close to this face, staring at the spiderweb cracks as if the faint shimmering afterimage they left could give him answers. "Shiro, what… what happened? We… I mean, we were fighting, and then that thing hit us, and Voltron broke and… and…!" His voice hurt in his throat, wavering - his eyes stung, the visor blurring. _Hunk was down there and Pidge was… silent._

But it was Keith who answered him.

" _Lance… We have to get back to the Castle, okay? Right now. Hunk needs to get into a healing pod._ _ **Right now.**_ _Ask questions later."_

No, that had been a lie. Keith didn't answer him - that wasn't an _answer_. Keith was blowing him off, even now - _right now! After everything that just fucking happened!_ And he could hear Shiro's hiss, and turned to look out and saw Black carefully trying to get Yellow into the air, thrusters straining, wings open wide. Red was above them, glinting, drifting towards Pidge.

Lance felt the tears spill over, and with it the numbness in his limbs broke into an ache so deep Blue let out a snarl. "Fuck you, Keith!" Lance shouted, squeezing his eyes shut. "Why are you- just tell me what happened? What _happened?!_ "

Maybe it wasn't fair. Maybe they didn't know. But Lance didn't care - everything had happened so fast, and Hunk was hurt and Pidge was hurt, and they were carrying dead Lions home _again_ _ **again**_ and the whole fucking planet had swallowed the robeast whole and-

" _Lance, that… It was… Hunk went coalescent."_

Keith's voice seemed calmer now, almost… gentle. Like he was trying to soothe Lance. Like Lance was a fucking child.

But then it registered. _Coalescence._ The light, the noise, the sheer power of it, and Hunk- The whole planet- Yellow had been _glowing_ …

Coalescence.

Lance didn't move, couldn't bring his body obey him, could only slowly shift his gaze up as Red got her claws around Green and lifted the Lion into the air and rose, but Blue fired her thrusters and followed anyway. Their bond hovered open, separate in their own bodies but present, reassuring. She was right there. She'd always be right there.

It didn't occur to him that he was flying Blue without laying a hand on her flightwheels.

"He…" Lance managed, feeling the words catch in his throat, choking him. His hands tightened on his helmet, the tears dripping off his jaw. His armour felt so heavy, the bodysuit sticking to his skin, tacky and fetid. "B-but…"

Shiro was silent, but once more Keith responded. His voice was still… gentle. Soothing. Somehow, it _helped_. Maybe Lance needed it anyway - maybe he _was_ a child.

" _... It'll be okay, Lance. You're okay, and you…"_

Went coalescent. Lance didn't really remember it, but the others had filled him in. He remembered… Blue, and pain, and ice, and _blueness_ everywhere. But Hunk always had that shiver in his voice when he talked about it, Shiro went silent. _Like he's silent now._ Pidge and Keith always exchanged this… _look_ when it was brought up, a look Lance still couldn't quite decipher.

And there was a note in Keith's voice that Lance didn't quite recognise, that he didn't…

 _Oh._

"... I… Keith?" He sounded tiny, as they broke through the atmosphere and the strain on their Lions faded, and they started the long glide back home.

" _Yeah, Lance?"_

"... Is… I mean… When I… Is that what… it was like?"

He couldn't see, everything was so blurry, and it _stung_ , like it was just salt in his eyes and not tears, and his voice was so tiny, so weak. Shame burned in his chest, that he'd done something like this, and suddenly the covert glances made sense, the shivers of fear, the silent, uncertain, unhappy awe in Shiro's narrowed gaze whenever they spoke of it. Lance gripped the helmet even tighter, the cracks shimmering, some detached part wondering - _almost hoping_ \- that it would shatter in his hands. The shame clawed at his lungs, made his heart feel like stone - he couldn't _breathe_ , couldn't see, there was a ringing in his ears that-

" _... Yeah. Lance. That's what coalescence looks like."_


	3. Shiro, of Sky

**A'ight, so I know this took a bit, but I started working and stuff. It's been kicking my ass. Dogs are assholes, I will fight you on this.**

 **Anyways, I finally got this bad boy done! Only three more chapters to go, and boy is that last one going to fucking destroy me. Here's Shiro, still never catching a break. #Let Shiro Rest 2k18. I haven't edited this at all (I literally finished it like ten minutes ago), but I probably won't edit anything that's messed up here. This site is too finicky tbh. This whole story is crossposted here from Ao3 anyway. My username there is StarlightLion, and I WILL actually edit mistakes on that one because _god_ is it easier to do there.**

 **Thanks for reading!**

* * *

The first time Shiro did it, he was terrified and alone.

* * *

It was hard to blame anyone for it. Hard, but it didn't stop some tiny part of him from raging against the Alteans. Shiro had always been good at hard.

It wasn't fair to blame them - Allura hadn't even been present, she'd probably been hurt when they'd gotten her out - it had been Zarkon's witch who had corrupted the wormhole, something Allura couldn't have stopped - it wasn't fair, but part of Shiro still blamed them.

 _They didn't warn me. The never told me._

Zarkon had torn open his bond to Sable and stepped inside it. It made Shiro's skin crawl just thinking about it - remembering made other flashes come to mind, flickers of invasion, of trauma. And while they'd been… like that - _bonded_ \- Shiro had been able to feel Zarkon against his mind, like he could feel the other Paladins when they formed Voltron, like he could feel Sable.

It made him shudder, thinking about how close he'd been with the enemy. Not strictly speaking because of the fact itself, not even necessarily because of the _intimacy_ of that bond, but because… There was something, deep inside Zarkon, a raging desperation that drove him - something screaming and lonely and exigent that Shiro… recognised.

The part that rose to the fore as Sable was dragged from the Castleship's main hangar and hurled into the open void, spinning. A pained groan escaped him as he was jostled, luminescent purple oozing down his side. The metal hand went against it, pressing down. Shiro couldn't tell if it was sticky or slippery, if the wound was hot to the touch. It felt hot, from the other side, but he couldn't be sure that wasn't just pain talking.

" _Keith! Shiro!"_ Lance's voice rang in his ears, flaring across the radio, but he couldn't do anything. On the other side of the wormhole, Shiro saw the Blue Lion spiral towards the crackling wall. It was just a glimpse, a flash of blue against the filthy violet-red, as Sable spun as well.

"Sable, come on girl," Shiro muttered, pulling back on one flightwheel with his free hand, but Sable pressed against his mind and otherwise didn't respond.

She was exhausted. It shone through his thoughts, a deep black light; she was hurt and tired and she didn't have the energy to resist the wormhole falling apart around them. Shiro braced back in his seat, head tucked down, and closed his eyes.

The impact against the wormhole wall was like slipping into a tepid pool. It didn't shudder or shake, as Shiro had expected - it felt almost the same as entering or exiting a stable wormhole. Something passed over his body, a sensation, a faint caress, like silk made liquid. It felt worse than a normal wormhole though, something about it clinging to his body, as if it were rotted and sticky. His stomach turned.

Sable mewled in his mind, equally as disgusted by the feeling, struggling to get her body into gear, to- _keep me safe._ Letting go of the flightwheel, Shiro reached out to pat the console. The touch against his thoughts was weak, flickering - the gentle breeze that swept from her to him was gone, Sable barely hanging on.

It wasn't _consciousness_ the same way that Shiro was conscious or unconscious; even without the wind, as Sable flickered away, he didn't stop being able to sense her. She was still _there_ , just the Lion was still running reserve power - dim, lavender light filling the cockpit, warnings flashing across the viewscreen, still displaying the outside world from Sable's eyes. But she didn't move against his thoughts anymore, as she did when she was… awake- when she was safe, at full power. There was no response, but Shiro pulled on her mind anyway, watching the ground hurtle towards them.

Somewhere in the distance, just a tiny red flicker on Sable's sensors, Keith was falling too.

Fear rose up in his throat. A visceral feeling, heavy and smoky and choking - _terror._ They were falling deadweight, towards what looked like a solid planet, and the searing bubbling pain in his side wouldn't let him forget that he was already wounded. It was seeping inward, inside him, a burning feeling like he'd swallowed acid. He had no idea where he was, how to get in contact with Allura, how to get away. Sable was dead in the air. If he even survived the inevitable impact, he was wounded and didn't have a weapon. His Galra arm, sure - but that hand was pressed against his side, the arm held as close to his body as possible, because moving it made everything hurt _worse._ He didn't know what kind of life inhabited this world - if any - and he certainly didn't know the dangers of the terrain.

And Keith was here too. Falling.

…

…

…

The first thing that Shiro felt again after the nothingness was the acid in his side. It drew a long, low whine from his throat, too foggy and dizzy to hold it back, and Shiro pressed his hand against it. For a second, the contact was scalding and he moaned, but then the pressure numbed it and he could start to think again.

It was dark inside Sable. Not even her viewscreens were running, the ambient light completely dead. Shiro reached for her presence, and she was there - not gone - but so quiet and so still that he knew he couldn't rely on her firepower any time soon. All the same, he reached out again and rested his human hand on the console, gently. "Okay, girl. Rest up. I'll go see what's outside."

It took a little doing, getting out of his seat and back to the hatch on the top of Sable's head. Pain flared up in his side with every movement, creeping up his spine and down across his hip towards his groin. He could feel the… whatever magic it was that Zarkon's witch had attacked him with- _the Druid leader._ A shudder ran through him, worsening the feeling. It was painful, magic acid, but it almost felt cold, like tendrils of ice inside him.

Sable was still quiet in his mind, absolutely still, but if Shiro concentrated hard enough he could almost imagine her comforting purr. Even if it wasn't real, it helped a little.

There was no response when Shiro touched the pad to open the hatch. _Right._ Even the viewscreens weren't working. A little gingerly, he hunted around for the manual release and pulled it. It was harder than he expected, using his human arm to do it, the burning acid sharpening as his muscles tightened, but finally, with a _clunk,_ it gave. Instead of the hatch on top of Sable's head, the one at the far back dropped open, rattling his teeth. Immediately, reacting to a thought of panic, his helmet shut over, sealing.

Without Sable, he had no way to check if the outside atmosphere was breathable until he was out there.

Safely breathing, Shiro made his way outside. The impact of his feet on Sable's bottom jaw sent a shockwave through his body, dragging another low sound of pain from him, and a deep ache sparked in his ankles. He was hurt and slipping, landing wrong, forgetting basic things like oxygen safety.

 _I hope they find us soon. Somehow._

Even as Shiro walked down the length of Sable's muzzle, the readings inside his visor confirmed that the atmosphere was breathable, and he let the helmet slip open again. It was a little muggy, the air stale and dusty, but it breathed just fine. Relieved that he wouldn't run the risk of depleting his oxygen supply, Shiro made it to Sable's lips, carefully lowered himself down - and even so, the short drop to the ground jarred his body and shot pain up his spine - and then looked around.

He couldn't see anything but the jagged pale stone and the canyon they'd crashed into, but something felt… wrong. He felt threatened. Maybe it was just the magic toxifying him.

But Keith was out there, somewhere. He'd fallen and landed here right alongside Shiro, on this empty planet. (Shiro hoped it was empty, because they didn't have the means to fight off hostiles right now. Shiro hoped it wasn't empty, because they didn't have the means to survive something barren for long).

"Keith?" he coughed out, checking their comms were still up, scanning the canyon for a scalable slope. He was lucky; nearby, a curling track up the side of a rocky spire, wide enough to have driven a vehicle up, shallow enough for Shiro to climb even hurt as he was. The radio crackled back at him, too distant or deep in the canyon to travel. _Damaged_. Considering it usually carried through space and enemy battlecruisers just fine, Shiro rather suspected it was.

Still, much as Shiro didn't want to admit it, he needed Keith. He was wounded and only getting worse, and Sable was currently out of commission - he needed an ally. Despite how the thought of Keith stranded here made his gut twist with guilt, he was lucky that Keith was. "Keith, are you there? Keith!" Raising his voice, even that little, proved to be… detrimental.

But over the sudden burr in his throat and the resulting coughing fit, he heard the static crackle into words. " _...ir...Sh...re...th…?"_ Keith. Relief flooded through Shiro's body, tingling. He made his way up another few steps, just to ensure the connection stayed stable, and then he collapsed against the rock. Shiro could hear the scraping as it scratched his armour, sliding down until he was sitting, metal hand still pressed against his side. " _Shir...re you th…? Answer me!"_

"Keith," he forced out, taking a slow breath to try and control the urge to cough more. "I'm here, Keith."

" _Shiro! You made it."_ Keith's voice wobbled, just the slightest bit; he'd been scared.

Shiro tried to force the pain out of his voice. It would only make it worse, and right now Keith needed to be worried about… well, 'himself' sounded disingenuous given Shiro's position, but…

"It takes more than a glowing alien wound, a fall from the upper atmosphere and crashing into a hard pan surface, at," Shiro glanced down at Sable and then up at the sky, trying to feel how heavy the gravity was against his skin, "what I'm guessing is about twenty five meters per second squared to get rid of me." And then, very quickly, hyper aware he'd slipped up and mentioned the magic acid burn, "How are you?"

It worked, for a long enough moment. " _Not good. My Lion's busted."_ Join the club. " _Wait- What wound?!"_

There it was. "It's nothing," Shiro dismissed, even as he sat up a little straighter and pain seared across his ribcage, drawing a soft hiss. He could only hope that it didn't carry across the radio.

" _Hang on,"_ it sounded like an order, " _I'm coming."_

It was a relief, even though Shiro knew he'd be coming already, even though he didn't want Keith to worry. The wound _burned._ In all honesty, Keith probably should be worried; Shiro was trying to ignore it, shove the rising fear aside so that he could control himself, stay steady, not panic. Panic would make it worse. But still, he could feel it around the edges, his nerves starting to fray, the fear creeping in. They were lost, on some godforsaken planet in the middle of fuck knew where, with both Lions out of commission, and Shiro was wounded. And it was _spreading._ Shiro was pretty sure that without treatment, the wound would eventually kill him. _Or worse._ He shuddered and tried not to think about that, about the glowing yellow eyes set in his own face, about what the witch had shown him. About what he could - _he would never_ \- become.

There was a sound. Soft, a low clicking hiss, somewhere below him. Shiro looked, and felt the fear reach up and throttle him. Down below, crawling all over Sable's body, were… _creatures._ Long bodied and covered in pale lavender… hide? Scales? Shiro wasn't sure which. An even paler star of lilac splashed over their backs - three of them. _No._ Four of them, the last around Sable's back, almost hidden but for the end of a long, thick tail, tipped in a trio of spikes.

They almost looked like dogs, if dogs were reptilian and had boar tusks. And they were crawling over Sable - sniffing. They could probably smell him. And Shiro knew carnivorous characteristics when he saw them.

He wasn't going to be able to fight them off; not like this. Not that many. One, maybe, if he got lucky, or if Sable got her metaphorical feet back under her. As it stood… "On second thought, you'd better hurry."

The lizard creatures were starting to lose interest in Sable. Some deep part of Shiro was glad, because watching them crawl over her like she was a particularly interesting corpse triggered a deep revulsion in him, something that sat heavy in his chest like an overweight parasite, something that made his vision blur. But the sane part of him wished they'd stay right where they were.

He'd been stupid enough to leave Sable, injured and probably unable to defend himself. Certainly unable to effectively. If they turned on him instead - and he made much better prey than a steel monolith - then chances were he'd lose.

 _Shit._

Trying to be inconspicuous - _I wonder what their vision is like? I'm in my armour; please rely on anything except sight_ \- Shiro pressed himself into the rock. Reflexively, he reached for Sable. It was worse now, than it had been even yesterday - the instinct. Sable was his… guardian, he supposed. It was the impression she gave him, surging into his mind whenever he needed her, doing her best to ward away the nightmares. It didn't always work, but he always seemed to sleep better inside her than in his bed.

And she stirred.

Faint, so faintly, that Shiro pushed away the burst of hope that she'd be able to save him; she wasn't there yet. And pain sparked through the link as she did. Distant, numb pain, not the same as his own (searing brightly in his side), but she was feeling everything that had happened. The battle, Zarkon, their crash. It made his bones ache.

But she shifted against his mind, just a whisper, and he felt better despite the ache. Sable was going to be okay. Maybe not soon enough to save him from these creatures, but soon enough.

Carefully, trying to keep silent even as he clenched his jaw against the spasm in his muscles and his teeth threatened to crack, Shiro tucked his feet under him and rolled his weight forward. Once he was on his knees, he balanced on his good hand, got a foot under him, and every so slowly eased himself up into a crouching position. Okay, so far so-

Something clattered down beside him, and four reptilian heads turned to face the sound. _No._ Three heads turned towards the sound. Now that they were looking at him, Shiro could see that they each had four eyes. _That's just not fair._

Looking behind him, Shiro saw the fourth creature dropping down behind him. Up close, they were more like horses than dogs. Horses with the same sort of spikes on their tails lining the underside of their necks, and the front of their forelimbs. Its mouth was open slightly, revealing a glimpse of razor teeth and a fat, pale tongue. It took a slow step towards him, but it didn't attack.

Not yet.

" _Shiro, what happened?"_ Had he been able to hear the falling rocks over the radio? Or had Shiro cursed aloud and just not noticed?

It probably didn't matter. "There's… several creatures…" Shiro replied, as softly as he could, keeping his eyes on the monster before him. Twin _thuds_ sounded from behind him, followed immediately by a third, and then the sound of claws scraping the ground. He chanced a quick glance behind him; the other three, now creeping up the pathway, eyes locked on him. "Fuck."

He rarely swore aloud, but this was the kind of situation that called for it, in Shiro's opinion. For a moment, he locked eyes with the closest creature, and it came even closer, teeth parting a little further, one paw lifted off the ground. Shiro could see the ripple of hard muscle under the hide - _it was hide after all_ \- as it started to tense, tail swaying slightly, nose dipping.

Frantically, Shiro looked around. He tried to keep the creature in his periphery, and tried even harder to keep tabs on the other three, but he couldn't see everywhere at once.

But he couldn't fight them - not four, not now, not at _that_ size and without a real weapon - and his route back to Sable was cut off. All he had to do was get away from them. Hide, or sneak back to Sable. Or find somewhere they couldn't reach him. They could, and better than him, but he was smaller. Even a-

 _There!_ A gap in the far rock wall, small enough that they shouldn't be able to follow him, but dark enough that it was probably a cave.

Shiro glanced sideways again, calculating; fear thundered through his chest as he almost came nose to nose with the closest creature. It was still coiled, quivering - one paw wa halfway lifted into the air.

Without another second of hesitation, Shiro threw himself off the edge of the path. Bitterly sharp claws sang through the air behind him.

It _hurt_ when he hit the ground, skidding, the sheer rock crumbling under his feet even as he slid down. The pain shuddered through his whole body, racing out under his skin as if separating it from his flesh. _(He knew what the felt like but don't think about it, don't, just breathe and run, survive)._

His breath rasped out in short heaves, his heart racing, both hands held out to the sides, swinging wildly, counterbalancing each haphazard movement. It was all Shiro could do to stay upright; if he slipped, he'd fall. It would probably kill him. Either he'd land badly, or roll badly, or he just wouldn't recover - and he'd get eaten. He hoped he gave them indigestion.

Shiro did stumble when he reached the bottom, the rock evening out into the hard, dusty flat Sable had broken upon, but he stayed on his feet. Each impact made his ribs feel like they were cracking, crumbling under the acid that had broken through even his armour, but he kept running anyway. Behind him, he could hear the crashing as rock crumbled under the creatures' claws.

The _thuds_ came closer as he ran for the narrow gap, gaining ground on him. He could almost feel them when he finally got close enough - maybe it was his imagination, but he thought he felt their claws brush by. He dove, flickers of red and white filling his vision, and felt Sable move against his thoughts. She barely touched, fuzzy like someone struggling to wake, but she there - she was trying to get to him, desperately, feeling his pain and distress.

 _Come on, Sable._ He hated calling on her like this, pulling on the faint touch when she was already so weak, torn open by Zarkon, bearing the brunt of the wormhole catastrophe, and protecting him as best she could from the crash landing. But that was the emotional part of him - the part that wanted to protect her, because he loved her, because she was _his,_ whatever Zarkon might think. The part that would die before becoming a burden on her. He tried to push that aside, to listen to what she'd poured into him day after week after month - that he was hers too, that she was bigger and older and stronger and that she would protect him from everything she could. She loved him.

So he pulled, reaching into the distant movement. She moved again, a slither, the quietest mew, but she moved.

In the real world, the creatures had slammed into the cliff face in a dogpile, shaking the stone and rattling Shiro's teeth. If they hadn't already been clenched, he might have bitten his tongue. A rumble sounded above them, and rocks cascaded down around the cave. Shiro pulled in his limbs, panic searing his thoughts, but the back of the (surprisingly shallow) cave held. The entrance was covered, leaving just enough gaps to let the light filter through and Shiro see their faces. They snuffled at the gaps, snarled - a low sound that reminded Shiro of a bear.

Only then did the staticky sounds coming through their comms register in Shiro's ears. A wordless shout sounded, followed by a string of curses. There was something roaring in the background, a rushing sound that was so familiar, flashing across Shiro's thoughts, but he couldn't quite place it.

There was a _crack_ across the radio, followed by another rush - Keith let out a grunt of impact, and then a shrill cry.

"Keith! Are you okay?! What happened?" Sharply, more so than Shiro intended. The panic in his chest, already tight, slithered across to Sable, and she writhed in his thoughts.

Keith's voice was strained when he replied, but steady. " _Minor delay, but I'm fine. How are you?"_ A sharp note, half buried - he'd heard the commotion Shiro had made too.

"I'm alright," Shiro assured him quickly. He bit down on the pain that was his whole abdomen now. "But I'm trapped in a cave. Some nasty-looking creatures have me cornered." With just a shiver in his voice, something he couldn't quite hide completely. With the other Paladins, he might have talked over it just enough - they might not have noticed. But Keith knew him better than that.

Hard, something grim in there, Keith gave him another order. " _Stay put."_ _Yeah, not that I have anywhere to go._ Shiro was truly trapped. The only way out now was through the lizards' jaws. " _I'm on my way. I just… have to figure this out."_

 _Me too._

Taking a slow breath - wincing as it pressed against the acid in his body - Shiro closed his eyes and tried to tune out the creatures. Outside, he could hear them pacing and snarling, scratching the ground, whacking their (tails? heads?) against the rock face in frustration. It was sour, the thought that they wanted to eat him. If he let himself, he could imagine _(remember)_ how it would feel if they didn't bother to kill him first. But that made him shake, so he drowned the thought out and focused on Sable.

She was still so distant. He could barely feel her movement, let alone the normal warm breeze that danced from her mind to his. But she was moving more now, an almost constant writhing that mercifully distracted him from the fiends outside.

Shiro focused on breathing steadily. Four seconds in, hold for two, four seconds out. Eyes closed, listening to the air in his body, sinking himself into Sable's tremors. Part of him was still focused on the creatures, still wary of when they'd start digging. He'd seen their massive claws, the wide paws and dexterous toes. He had no doubt that they would.

" _Patience yields focus."_

It was soft, spoken on a natural exhale; a mantra that Shiro had come to associate with Keith more than the woman who'd taught it to him. He broke focus - couldn't help it. A soft chuckle escaped him. "That really stayed with you, didn't it?" The warmth in his chest was enough to counteract the pain, just for a moment.

" _You've given me some good advice."_ Spoken absently, like Keith was thinking intently about something else - _focusing._ " _If it wasn't for you, my life would have been a lot different."_

The warmth bloomed in his chest again, but there was something cold at the heart of it. "Yeah. You wouldn't have crashed a flying lion on an alien planet and be stuck with little hope of rescue. So, you're welcome." And there was a part of him that believed that. Some deeply buried, shameful flicker of guilt that he'd ever gotten involved in Keith's life. If not for that, he would still be on Earth, safe, studying at the Garrison. If not for Shiro, Keith wouldn't be stuck halfway across the universe with no hope of ever going home and the responsibility of an entire, millennia old war on his shoulders.

 _Home._ The thought tasted bitter. Or maybe that was just the acid reaching his mouth. But those thoughts, Shiro shook off. He knew better, no matter what the voice in the back of his head told him. If not for Shiro, Keith would have drowned. If not for Shiro, Keith might have wanted to. _Home._ But Keith had forgotten what home was like by the time they met. Shiro knew that Keith considered him family now.

 _So you're welcome._

There was something like static over the radio again, that deep rushing sound that Shiro couldn't place. He tried, for a moment, and then he was jarred out of his thoughts. _Crash._ Frantically, he looked towards the gaps in the rocks that had trapped him - wait. Were they bigger than before?

 _Crash._

Oh god.

Claws pushed through the gaps, rock grinding and scraping under the pressure. Dust filled the air and caught in Shiro's throat - thick, clogging. It caught against the acid that had filled him and he coughed; a harsh, hacking sound that probably sounded like he was dying. He _felt_ like he was dying. The contractions scraped inside his chest, leaving him feeling raw and hurt - his muscles seized, cramp laying over the burning pain in his abdominal muscles.

" _Stay with me, Shiro."_

Decidedly not a request. Keith was getting good at giving orders. The rushing sound was back, in the background, but even as it faded Keith let out a sharp yell, and then a shrill scream. Not a startled sound - a fearful one.

"Keith! Keith!" Shiro shouted, despite the pain that caused him and the pounding, ringing pulses that went through his skull. He coughed again, choking on it.

" _Hang on, I'm on my way."_ A little out of breath, but he sounded fine. Grim. Relief flooded Shiro's body, erasing the acid for a split second. The earlier thoughts came back; _if he dies here, it's my fault. If I die here, he's alone._ Fear filled his throat.

The claws came back through the gaps, grating - tugging rock backward, splintering it apart. How much sheer physical strength did these creatures have? Shiro didn't know the density of the rock, couldn't do the calculations, couldn't think, couldn't _breathe._ "Good," he managed to choke out, his voice raspy and weak and uneven. He heard Keith's panting through the radio as he sped up. "Because they just… started digging."

The rocks were clawed away, sunlight filtering in. Fresher air hit him, but Shiro couldn't taste it, could barely breathe it. His heart was racing. He'd been afraid before - _god_ he'd been afraid before - but he couldn't defend himself right now. This wasn't a pit fight, this wasn't his life against someone else's. He was helpless.

 _Glinting bone masks. Yellow eyeslits. Sweeping dark robes and flickering lights and-_

Shiro tried to pull himself together, to focus on the moment. He pressed his hand against his side and bit his lip, scrambling desperately for his senses. Stale air, heat, grunting and snarling and the scrape _crash_ of rock being flung away. A massive, dark purple nose was stuck into the cave, and Shiro _kicked._

" _Shiro, I have a visual on the Black Lion!"_ It came through triumphant, relieved - Keith thought he'd made it in time. Keith thought he'd- _oh god-_ but it wasn't, it was too late, it was-

Claws reached in and grabbed at him. They scraped down his armour, throwing sparks, and a howl of frustration went up around him. _The lightning crackled around him, the light condensed into something round and blinding and sharp._ With another swipe, the creature got its claws on Shiro's other side, and hooked him, and pulled. _His stomach dropped out of his body as took the hit and went flying across the arena, until he smacked into the wall._

He smacked into the ground, and he rolled. Each impact sent pain thundering through him, filling his skin like liquid, blinding him. He felt like he might rupture at any moment, overflowing with acid and fire and exquisitely throbbing pressure. Everything turned white for a few moments.

" _Shiro, what happened?!"_ Absolute panic. Shiro groaned and tried to push himself up, tried to _get up._ He had to be on his feet to defend himself. The creatures were surrounding him, he could hear their eager footsteps.

He had shouted? Screamed? Who knew. _Keith knew._

Again, Shiro tried to push himself up. He managed his hands and knees, feeling something metallic and sickly and burning in his throat. His vision wasn't white anymore, but it didn't seem quite right either. Ever so slightly warped. The crack in his visor was a little wider now.

 _Pain so excruciating it blocked out everything else, until he was nothing but raw nerves and the desire for relief. Bright light that burned his retinas when he was aware he could see again. Something sickly wafting across his face, oily white hair, a bittersweet crooning. Movement, under his skin - inside his veins, inside his mind. Creeping - invading._

 _The pain._

 _Fear pulsing in his body._

 _Can't breathe._

 _Heart too fast._

 _Throat closed._

 _I can't- I'm going to die- I want to-_

A roar blew it all apart. Shiro sucked in a breath, head spinning, tears in the corners of his eyes. If they were from fear or just pain, Shiro couldn't tell. For a moment, all he could do was lift his head and look, afraid, cornered and surrounded. Four creatures, jaws parted, slowly closing in.

But they hadn't made that sound. They couldn't have. They were far from silent, but they moved like ambush predators. Shiro supposed he was small and weak enough to hunt outright.

The roar blasted through his mind again, a bomb going off. He shuddered, leaping into it, pressing close to Sable's presence. She was weak, still, but the distance was gone. She wasn't moving, not her physical body, the glimpse Shiro could see over the cliff he'd jumped off, but she were _here._ She was struggling, clawing into him right back, clinging desperately to whatever purchase she found in his mind because he was hurt and terrified and needed her and if not for that she would still be sleeping.

They both knew it. So they clung, as tightly as they could.

Something trickled from her mind into his, a thin dribble. _Quintessence._ Shiro felt it, a chill air off the ocean just before a storm. It breathed into him, numbing the worst of the pain, and finally - he stood up.

He met the creatures' eyes. They were rotating around him, creeping closer. He didn't have 360 vision; he couldn't keep track of them all. Shiro wasn't sure if they actually knew that, or if it was just built into their instincts - but either way, he needed to be prepared.

Drawing on Sable's presence, on the steady, weak trickle of quintessence she offered, he drew as deep a breath as he dared and activated his Galra arm. It _scorched_ him, the heat that normally took time to build up flooding up him, the acid in his side boiling instantly. He let out a groan of pain, and felt his body curl forward, trying to escape it, but he stayed standing. He waited. Ready.

The first one to attack him came from the right. A little behind him. He heard the sudden scrape of claws on the ground and spun in time to see it sail towards him. _Sail_ was probably too kind a description - the creature was heavy and bulky. It didn't sail so much as barrel towards him, a pounce that made the muscles under its hide ripple and coil and stretch.

Shiro caught it.

His glowing hand went up, and a low moan escaped him as it pulled his side taut, but he caught the creature by its jaw and twisted, deflecting it. Momentum did the rest, carrying the creature sideways and into the ground. It shook. Skidding and rolling, clambering for a grip in the dusty flats, the creature slammed into one of its fellows and took them both down, snarling and howling. Shiro was pretty sure one of them gored the other.

But the last two didn't hesitate. One of them slunk around his other side, came closer, raised a paw to bat him down. The other gunned it, jumping at him as soon as he deflected the initial attack.

Energy burned through his arm, searing flesh where it connected, boiling his blood as it spread across his chest. Shiro's heart felt like it was going to stop. Everything hurt so fucking much - but Sable whined in his thoughts, sent another little pulse of quintessence, bolstered him.

She shouldn't be doing it. Shiro shouldn't be taking it. It was probably too much, he knew only too well that his body couldn't handle much of Sable's power even when he was in peak condition. Right now, injured and dying, he was sure it would only hasten the issue. But it was also the only thing keeping him on his feet. Every little sip of that power blew through his body, both feeding and cooling the acid fire.

He pushed away the next creature, feeding that power into his glowing hand, watching the purple burn so bright it was almost white. It went flying too, howling as smoke curled off their point of contact, scorched by the heat and light and quintessence.

The effort sent him to his knees again, struggling to breathe. The light in his arm died; Shiro couldn't maintain it, couldn't maintain the blistering heat and pain that boiled away under his skin. Sable pressed closer, wrapping around his mind, and he breathed in her quintessence, letting it soothe him, just a little, just enough to see the creatures getting back to their feet, starting to approach him again. The one he'd burned stayed back, a high-pitched snarling sound emanating from it, but the others held no such caution. They crept closer, tails weaving side to side, noses close to the ground, boxing him in.

He couldn't get up. Sable's breath was enough to keep him on his knees, keep his senses working. Enough to dim the pain enough to watch his death approach.

 _If I die here, Keith is alone._

 _If I die here, Voltron is leaderless._

 _If I die here, the universe is defenceless._

 _If I die here, then the Galra Empire will win._

Sable was getting stronger all the time, pressing into him, breathing more and more quintessence through their link. It made his vision flicker, and he was pretty sure he couldn't hear properly, but Shiro got to his feet.

Then, for a moment, ice and magma flashed through his mind, the pain and stillness and fear that had followed. Fear followed. Instinctively, Shiro took a step backwards, trying to move away from the realisation. But there was a growl that rumbled through him, and Sable pressed another breath of quintessence into him.

 _No, no._ He pressed his Galra hand against his side, ducked his head, tried to pull away. It felt _wrong_ to be withdrawing from Sable's touch, it felt like tearing out his own lungs, but he did it anyway, the fear filling his head, blinding him.

Because he didn't want to risk it. Not with Keith so close, not as injured as he already was. Not as weak as Sable had become. He pulled away and resisted the flow of quintessence. It was like breathing in water - it was like being choked. Sable was air and sky and freedom. Every nerve screamed for him to give in, to let her swaddle him in wind and power and magic, to let her fix everything.

But it wouldn't fix everything. Keith was coming - they didn't need this. Sable needed to stop. _Please, Sable. Stop._ She chased after his retreating thoughts, dug her claws in as hard as she could. She ignored the plea - bit down, locked them together. Quintessence blasted around their link, wisps sneaking past Shiro's defences, and each little gust brought with it more weakness, more gaps, more quintessence.

Sable had made up her mind. But Shiro sank back to his knees, curling over, hugging himself, even as the creatures hesitated. Tried to push it back. Kept pleading. _Please, Sable. Please don't me._

The response was a roar, quintessence whirling around him like a hurricane, dry-drowning him. Sable would have none of it. She was afraid - afraid that Shiro was too hurt to fight, that she couldn't get her metal body to move. She was still too weak to fight back any other way. Shiro wouldn't die here - Sable wouldn't let him.

 _Please, Sable. Please don't make me go coalescent._

It would save him. Probably. Certainly, these creatures would stand no chance. It might even purge the acid in his veins, the foreign magic - _quintessence?_ \- that the Druid Supreme had infected him with. But still, coalescence did damage. Even if it didn't dissolve his body, even if he survived it, it could do other damage. Burn his soul. Break his mind.

Lance still lost his grip on reality, sometimes. It was getting rarer, and something about piloting Blue seemed to hold it off - maybe it was being so close to her. But it still happened; halfway through a sentence, midway through a meal, during training or rec-time or just while he was walking. Coalescence had detached something inside him. Sometimes he became detached with it. They'd been lucky, for so long, that Lance had never spaced during combat, or as Voltron, long enough that they were all starting to think it wouldn't happen. But if it ever did - if the damage coalescence had done triggered broke him when it mattered - then whoever was with him would be all that stood between Lance and death.

Hunk still didn't really talk anymore. He seemed happy otherwise, and he still made dinner (and breakfast and sometimes lunch) for Team Voltron, and he still helped Lance when he was troubled and he still geeked out with Pidge, but… actually talking was rare. Whatever had happened inside him during coalescence, it had shorted out his speech centers. It wasn't that he was _incapable_ of talking, because he still did sometimes, when he wanted to convey something bad enough, and it always came faster and easier when he was piloting Yellow, but it was difficult for him. Pidge had started to learn Altean sign language and was steadily helping Coran teach it to them all.

And even if Shiro survived, that was what he was looking at. If he miraculously escaped permanent physical harm (and there was no guarantee that he would) then he was looking at mental harm in some way - soul harm.

So he begged, frantically shoving away quintessence, letting the Galra hand light up and burn it off, even as the act strained an already broken body and drew out a scream of pain. Sable ignored it all, pushing quintessence through faster than he could use it, engulfing him.

 _The alternative was dying here._

A growl, rumbling through him, broke down the last of his defences. Even if he was weak right now, even if Sable wasn't an infinitely more powerful creature than he was, he couldn't resist. They were bonded - pulling away, resisting her, hurt almost as much as the acid did. It was too similar to what Zarkon had tried to do to them - to being ripped open, to having the bars between them that was Zarkon's mind.

Shiro gave in, let the fear and panic overwhelm him, and then let a rush of quintessence blow that all away. Sable breathed power into him, and then - when his lungs were full, when his body was humming, when he felt like his lungs might rupture - she kept going.

It almost hurt, but it was a good hurt. It wasn't the blunt hurt of battle, or the vicious sting of a Druid's knife. It was an almost out-of-body feeling, like he was flying, like he wasn't even quite real anymore. Sable purred, a deep sound that vibrated through his whole self, and Shiro languished in it. All emotion was blasted apart, there was a rushing, screaming sound in his ears, a gale - a tornado.

He felt… tranquil. He wouldn't die here. _They would._ He and Sable would remain together, remain safe.

If he'd been able to form a thought coherent enough, Shiro wouldn't have understood why he'd been so afraid of this. Sable was in every ounce of his body, touching everywhere, more intimate than any lover or torture that the Druids had visited upon him. She was everything, she was his breath, his heartbeat. She was thunderstorm crackling in his mind, she was the lightning that struck down their enemies, the thunder that heralded their approach.

The thunderstorm grew, scorching, screaming - a blistering tempest, a typhoon. Shiro let it lay him open, expand beyond his skin. It _hurt_ now, a bad hurt, agony as his body broke apart, unable to contain the power of a Lion, unable to direct Sable's soul.

But even as he let out a scream, Sable purred deep in his mind, the eye of the storm. The winds scattered in every direction, devouring everything, but Sable pulled him into the centre, a blissful dark void, and it was there that Shiro lost himself.

* * *

"Shiro, what happened?!"

Keith knew he sounded scared, the panic making everything taste like ash - no, like blood - but he couldn't bring himself to care. He was sprinting, taking great leaping strides with bursts of jetflame, blatantly ignoring how low the supply was getting. Allura would have his head later - but that meant that there would _be_ a later, that they'd survive this get back to the Castle and a lecture would be almost welcome if it meant that.

But Shiro didn't respond to the question. So Keith kept running, eyes on the distant curve of black that marked where his Lion lay.

When he reached the edge of the ravine, he didn't bother to look around. He just leapt right off the edge, wind flaring past his face, the drag threatening to pull his helmet off. It was loose, as he came too near the bottom and ignited his jetpack, full blast but too late to soften the landing completely. He hit feet first and immediately crumpled into a roll, trying to disperse the momentum.

Coming up running, Keith made his way to the Black Lion, and only when he reached it did he dare slow down. Frantically, he looked around, searching for Shiro - he knew Shiro wasn't inside the Lion, because he'd gotten trapped in a cave. _Stupid. Why didn't he stay put?_ But that was frustration, and fear. Keith knew why; they hadn't even been able to talk before Shiro had ventured out.

"Shiro!" he shouted, before he heard the howl. Racing towards it, Keith gripped his bayard tighter in hand, sending out a pulse of quintessence to activate it, ignoring the weird tugging sensation it produced. Blade out, Keith skidded to the edge of another cliff; a small one, just shallow enough to have skidded down.

Which seemed to be exactly what Shiro had done.

He was down there, on his knees, wounded; bleeding. His armour was damaged. When had that happened? Were the lizard things strong enough to do that? There were four of the lizard creatures, three that advanced on Shiro, circling him, one that was hanging back, one leg lifted. It looked like it was wounded. Had Shiro done that?

For a moment, Keith was still, indecisive. "Shiro!" he shouted again, but Shiro didn't even seem to hear him. Where was his helmet? He wasn't wearing it. But he'd had it in the cave - must have, they'd been talking. Fear gripped him.

The lizards were bigger than horses, judging by how tiny Shiro appeared next to them. Keith was good, but… four lizards that big, with all those claws and spikes and tusks, with Shiro to protect - Keith wasn't that good. He'd get them both killed trying to melee those things. It didn't stop his palms from itching, his fingers from tightening around the bayard's hilt, it didn't stop the desperate pounding of his heart as he fought the urge to leap down there _anyway._

Red was a distant pulsing in his mind, a soothing warmth. She agreed, on some level - jump down, _fight,_ kill the threat to his pridemate - but Keith knew that trying meant death for both of them. _Knew._ Trembling, Keith tore himself away and sprinted back to the Black Lion. He couldn't fight those things alone, but the Lion - she could.

His bayard was still active, the tip of the blade nearly touching the ground, but Keith couldn't seem to let it go silent. Instead, he reached up with his other hand, pressed his palm against Black's nose. "Black… Listen, I know I'm not Shiro but-"

A cry, from behind him. Shiro's voice. Keith flinched, bit his lip hard enough that he tasted blood, fighting down the electricity trickling down his spine.

"Please, Black. Let me fly you. Help me save him."

His voice shook. Sable wasn't like Red, she wasn't so picky as to let a potential Paladin die to prove themself, but still. Keith wasn't Shiro - Keith was no leader. Black would be well within her rights to completely refuse him. That she might let him pilot her - that she might even be strong enough for such a task - was outlandish, a wild hope. But Keith had to try anyway. He didn't have any other hope left.

Black's eyes lit up.

For a moment, relief flooded Keith's body, sheer joy, and his bayard deactivated in his hand, went light, and he grinned wildly up at the Black Lion. And then, she let out an audible growl, but she didn't sit, didn't move - she didn't open her mouth. Relief was replaced by confusion, joy by anger.

Keith hit her on the nose.

"What are you doing?!" he shouted, glancing over his shoulder even as Shiro let out another sound of pain. "Black, come on! He's going to- die…"

 _Oh._

 _No._

 _ **No.**_

Black's body shimmered, just a little. The faintest gleam came off her metallic black, the faintest purple sparkle - light that Keith almost barely couldn't quite see. The anger vanished, the fear drained into dread; in his chest, his heart suddenly felt like marble. He wasn't breathing - he wasn't even sure his heart was beating.

"No… Nonono… You can't - Black, you _can't!"_ Keith spun, bayard falling from numb fingers, and sprinted back to the edge, back to where he could see Shiro.

On the ground, on his knees, Shiro had gone still. His head was tipped back, and a golden glow emanated from his eyes. _Did they always do that?_ It was an idle thought, flitting through the back of Keith's mind. Red purred an affirmative that he almost didn't hear.

Keith took a step back. He'd never seen it up close before. He'd been in an entirely different ship the first time, and then observed from Green's cockpit - he'd been thrown clean out of range the second time, Red locked down by rock and furious, just able to see the glow and feel the land break apart.

Keith was pretty sure he didn't want to see it up close.

 _Shiro._

But he couldn't leave. He couldn't abandon Shiro - Shiro was practically his only family. Only, 'practically' made it sound less than true, and the truth was that Keith didn't have anyone else. Sure, the other Paladins now, and he cared about them, he did - but they weren't Shiro.

"Black! Stop it!" he turned and howled at her, at her blazing golden eyes and the luminescence of her body. It was like shouting at the sky. Nothing happened, there was no acknowledgement. Black just kept doing what she was doing. It wasn't tears in his eyes - it _wasn't_ \- when Keith looked back at Shiro, but they stung all the same.

The light had suffused Shiro's whole body, faintly purple. His hair was billowing - the long white bit, anyway - as if he'd been caught in a gale. The Galra hand was glowing brilliant white, too bright to look directly at, and the air around it shimmered. Keith took another step back as the wind reached him, whipping his hair up into a furious halo, strands stinging against his skin. He couldn't move, couldn't run.

He needed to. He needed to leave. But he couldn't bring himself to, he had to stand witness. Shiro would have died if left alone - but this might kill him anyway. Keith couldn't just run away.

The wind lifted, spinning, and Shiro rose off the ground. The lizards were yipping, snatches of sound reaching Keith through the burgeoning tornado, frantic, distressed. They turned tail and tried to run, claws skidding and scraping uselessly against the ground; the wind blasted them back, knocked them off their feet. With a gesture, Shiro brought them all closer, laying them out in a circle around him.

The wind was whipping up the dust, obscuring Shiro's form, turning into a luminous silhouette against the dust storm, but Keith could still see his eyes. The gold light cut through it all - a cold light. Merciless. Maybe that was just in Keith's mind.

A rumbling sound above his head drew Keith's attention. Clouds had drawn together over them, even though before the sky had been an endless dusty orange, smoky but clear. Now, dark black covered everything in sight, and it swirled above Shiro, forming around him, funnelling down. It was like watching a mega-disaster movie.

"Shiro!" Keith called out to him, only to realise that he couldn't hear his voice over the howling wind. He hadn't even noticed it get that loud.

Thunder _cracked_ across the sky. Despite himself, Keith flinched, found himself crouching- _cowering_ against the ground. Red rumbled in his thoughts, but she suddenly she seemed wary, drawing back on Keith's thoughts.

 _Red? You want me to run?_

The idea that Red was advocating - no, she was _urging_ for him to flee, it was outlandish. That, perhaps even more so than the raging thunderstorm, unnerved Keith. He stayed low to the ground, glad they were in a ravine, glad that Black was technically above him, even if the idea of her being struck with lightning (at all, but _especially_ right now) made his stomach turn. _There._ It flickered through the clouds, silent and eerie, a deep blue-green colour.

Thunder rolled out after it again, so Keith turned his eyes back to Shiro. His stomach turned, and he dug his fingers into the ground as hard as he could. Some visceral part of him wished he hadn't looked.

He hovered, a good four feet off the ground, wind and dust and thunder whipping around him like a tornado. For the most part, Keith couldn't even made out his form, just a dark smudge inside the whirlwind, but his Galra hand was glowing a bright white, and above that… his eyes shone through, twin points of blazing violet, like stars.

The air shuddered as thunder _cracked_ above him again.

Lightning crackled and then shot down from the sky, luminous aqua; it struck the ground ten feet away, and Keith jerked away from it, his breath ice in his lungs, heart hammering against his ribcage. _Oh god._ Fear rose in his throat like bile, the same acrid taste filling his mouth. The wind was so fierce Keith could feel it through that connecting material in his Paladin armour, biting into his skin with vicious fangs. And deep inside him, Red quivered.

Crawling, Keith made his way closer to Shiro. He was shivering, and every instinct was screaming for him to run, even Red - but that was Shiro down there. Keith couldn't just leave him. Heart clamouring in his chest like the thunder above, breath thin and gasped as the wind whipped the air away, adrenalin making his ears ring (or was that the storm?), barely able to think - and he was stuck, flat on the ground, watching as his best friend- _mentor- leader- brother-_ turned into a tornado.

This time, when the lightning struck, it missed the ground entirely. It struck Shiro, and for a moment Keith was blinded by the turquoise light, turning the tornado into a holy pillar. Then it condensed, snapping around him in a constant spiral stream, up and down the dust. Over the howl of the wind, Keith could hear a faint high pitched whine, like a scream, as the lightning desperately sought a way to ground itself and unleash its energy.

Eyes glowing blistering white, Shiro held out his Galra hand, visible inside the maelstrom only by its own glow, and withheld it.

A low growl rippled out from behind Keith, an almost physical force that cut through the wind for a moment. _Black._ He twisted on the ground, squinting against the dimmer light she was emitting. _Dimmer. Yeah right. I just can't see into ultraviolet._ For a strange, disconnected second, Keith wondered if the Lions could.

Black was finally moving. Just a little, just enough to rear her head and focus on her Paladin. But still, the light (it was more like dark purple shimmers, right at the edge of Keith's vision, just barely visible if he turned his head right) flowed off her body, and connected her to Shiro.

The rain, when it finally came down, was less like a sheet and more like having a building dropped on it. It was so think Keith couldn't see through it, so thick it came off the edge of his visor in a solid film of water, tempting him to close the helmet completely. It came down with _weight,_ pressing Keith's body into the ground, slicking the dust into sticky mud in seconds. The dust in Shiro's tornado turned thick and then whipped out in all directions, mud clinging to every surface. It moved fast enough that when it hit Keith in the shoulder, it felt like being shot. A soft hiss escaped him, and water sprayed out from the force of the air. The water soaked through the fabric parts of his armour, cutting through the water resistance, and he felt the bodysuit that went underneath chill and stick to his skin.

Vaguely, Keith realised he was shivering. A thread came through from Red, a tingle of heat and concern and- _fear._ Red was afraid. The warmth coiled in his chest, but Keith still shivered.

A bolt of mud hit Keith in the face, cracking against his visor; he wondered if it actually cracked it. It was no mean feat, to crack their visors; they were meant to withstand combat as Voltron, after all. With a thought, he closed the helmet completely. If that mud had been an inch lower, Keith was pretty sure he'd be spitting blood.

Slowly, the mud was wasted out of Shiro's tornado, and then Keith saw what had happened to it instead; the rain - although 'rain' felt like too tame a term for the flood that was coming down around them, whipped into a screaming roaring frenzy by the cyclone winds, a floating ocean that Keith was pretty sure he could drown in - but it had been absorbed by the twister.

They were in a ravine, on a foreign, dusty planet whose only water source so far had seemed to be underground, in what by all rights appeared to be a dry plains, but Shiro was no longer hovering inside a tornado. He was hovering inside a waterspout.

The lightning buzzed inside it, the whole thing made luminescent blue-green, electrified. Even as Keith watched, his vision of it blurred by the rain and the fizzing readings that displayed inside his helm, the lightning struck it again and was assimilated, a terrifying radiance. Tiny flames flickered in and out of life in seconds at the ground around him, as little fingers of electricity escaped Shiro's control and struck the ground with ignitive force, only to be snuffed out by wind and water.

The animals that had hunted Shiro were battling to escape his wrath, clawing at the ground, mouths open and heads tossing, tails turned on their would-be prey. Deep gouges littered the ground around each of them, trenches in the earth and mud where they'd been scrambling for freedom. Keith couldn't hear them over the cacophony of elements, but he knew what screaming animals looked like.

Somehow, the storm seemed to change timbre.

The waterspout held for a moment longer, seeming to breathe in water and wind as it did, lightning arcing down to touch it once again. Then, all at once, the whole thing erupted outwards, water and cutting wind and spitting electricity.

Finally, for a single moment, Keith could see Shiro clearly. Hovering, knees slightly bent, arms outstretched. His expression was completely obscured by his glowing eyes, his human arm held out for balance in whatever updraft and magic kept him afloat, while the blinding Galra hand directed the sky's assault. The water had burst around him, illuminated by the last lightning strike and boiling with electricity. It almost looked like it was blooming. Sparks flew from every drop as it blew outwards, connecting them in a deadly network, lighting up the sky - the strange light played across itself and made Shiro look utterly alien.

He didn't look _real._

Then, with a sudden scream _crack_ hiss, the lightning coalesced and struck all four of the lizard predators at once. The water smoked into vapour. The animals didn't burst or anything so dramatic - Keith was grateful for it - but there wasn't even time for death cries as their bodies jolted, seized, and collapsed. Blood (it was thick and dark, almost black) pooled under their bodies, leaking from every orifice.

The wind went silent.

For a moment, Keith thought it was over, as he watched Shiro's body fold inwards and the glowing light dim, like flipping a lightswitch. Almost in slow motion, the lightning died and the thunder quieted and there was just the rain, a solid sheet that pressed Keith against the ground still.

There was nothing graceful about how it struck Shiro's body, limp and vulnerable now, and slammed him into the ground, the wind that had kept him afloat gone. Shiro hit the ground left knee first, and Keith shrieked his name, even knowing it was pointless, that Shiro couldn't hear him. Wouldn't have been able to over the rain even if he'd been conscious.

Teeth gritted, trying to ignore how cold and numb and somehow still _aching_ his body felt, Keith tried to get his hands under him, tried to push himself up. Then, the cold snapped through him, half a second's warning, and the rain turned to hail.

Ice struck him everywhere, hollow _cracks_ against his armour, leaving bruises (cuts?) where it was lucky enough to hit the fabric joints. A chunk hit Keith's helmet, and everything rang. The world was muted.

For some time - too long - _minutes_ \- Keith wasn't sure - his sight was hazy, the colours dimmed, and the sound of the hail slowing seemed distant. He knew he was flat against the ground, his neck bent at an angle that strained his breathing, chin propped up by the bottom of his helmet on the ground, but it still felt like his whole body was vibrating, slowly tipping to the side.

By the time he became fully aware that he was blinking slow, dazed blinks, and that he wasn't tipping but instead shaking, the hail had stopped. The clouds were starting to thin out and fade. If not for the flooded ground (and huge pools of water glinted on all sides, tiny lakes leftover from the deluge, an unnatural flood that this landscape had no way of draining away), if not for the avocado sized balls of ice littering the ravine, if not for the scorch marks and the freezing, quivering agony in every part of Keith's body, he might have thought he'd imagined the whole event.

By the time he managed to get to his feet, the sky was clear. It stretched out above him in every direction, an endless expanse of dusty orange. Only in comparison did Keith realise how _dark_ the storm clouds had made it.

He hugged himself. He couldn't help it. He hurt everywhere, his head was pulsing with sick pain, bubbling behind his eyes like they'd been put out with knives. He was still shaking, deep quaking shudders that he could feel against his heartbeat, that made his breath catch. When he let his helmet slip open again, the draft of air was acrid with the tang of lightning.

One step, towards Shiro. Then another. Keith didn't look back at the Black Lion - couldn't bring himself to look her in the eyes. He couldn't get rid of the image of Shiro, hovering, a cruel master of the storm; but he knew deep down that Shiro had just been a conduit. That power (the thunder, the _rage)_ was hers.

It was too slow, it took him too long, but Keith slipped down the slope to where Shiro was. It had seemed a steep incline before, jagged and dangerous, but now Keith just sat and let his armour and the numbness shield him from whatever rocks might be lurking under the mudslide. With one arm (the left, because it hurt less than the right, however marginally), Keith directed his descent. The other arm stayed firmly curled over his stomach. Not because he didn't think he could use it, not because he had any obvious stomach wounds - he just couldn't make himself take it away.

When Keith's feet took his weight again, he swayed. _Nono. Stay up. You need to stay up. Shiro needs you. Shiro's dying._ Stumbling, Keith made his way to where Shiro lay. His feet felt heavy, everything; he was so _heavy._ But eventually, Keith reached the Black Paladin.

Relief flooded him, tingling under his skin, as Keith collapsed to his knees beside his brother. "Shiro?"

His voice cracked as he spoke, weak and tenuous. He sounded about six years old. But it was reflex, just fear; Keith knew Shiro wouldn't respond. That he couldn't. Instead, Keith looked him up and down, licking his lips nervously, and then very carefully reached out with both hands.

As slowly and gently as he could manage when he couldn't feel his fingers and every movement shook, Keith rolled Shiro onto his side. His leg - the one he'd landed on, Keith was sure - was splayed out at an angle that made Keith nauseas. Blood (mercifully, humanly, red) seeped out from under that leg.

Shiro's armour was destroyed. Pieces of it remained, swaths of fabric stuck to his skin and chunks of the lightweight metal that had melted and fused and warped into a second skin. Bits wove up Shiro's legs like an archipelago, a wide section was affixed to his stomach and side, curling up his ribcage like a giant island. Another chunk, smaller, stuck to the front of his left shoulder and curled over his collar. Nothing remained on his right arm. Tiny fragments littered the left, melted to his skin, seared into his flesh. Flecks of white showed on his neck and under his jaw, where it must have flown up as the armour had splintered and molten, but the rest was just… gone. Disintegrated.

For the first time, Keith was glad that Shiro had lost his helmet.

Shaking, motion blur crossing his vision even as he tried to hold steady, Keith reached out to run one hand through Shiro's hair. It was completely white, all colour bleached by Black's quintessence.

The sudden heat of Keith's tears against his cheeks _burned_ against the ice under his skin.

Shiro had hated the white tuft in his hair. He'd hidden it well, of course, he'd never talked about it - but Keith had known. It was just a little fringe of bleached hair, but it had been a symbol of everything that the Galra had done to him, to Shiro personally. He'd hated it, hated that it was so prominent, on display for everyone to see. Keith sometimes wondered why Shiro hadn't just cut it off. He probably hadn't been able to bring himself to do it.

But now…

The tears came hotter, streaks that burned down Keith's face and blurred his vision. A flicker of panic clenched in his chest, because it was so like the blinding rain, but Keith tried to push that away. It was just tears. _I'm just crying._

 _Shiro…_

Quavering, Keith ran his gloved fingers through Shiro's hair again, the white strands wet and clumped together, sticking to the fabric. He wasn't even sure why he was shaking anymore. Was it how cold he was? How wet and hurt? Was it just the fear and lingering panic and dismay? There was something in his chest like lead, something so heavy, so deep and empty and miserable that it made him want to scream.

Quiet, a tentative caress, Red rumbled in his mind. Keith clung to her, pulled her as close as he could; she was warmth and safety and love. Red surrounded his thoughts, wove between them until she had threaded herself through every part of him.

The shaking eased a little.

Keith took as deep a breath as he could manage, licked his lips, and tore his gaze away from Shiro's hair. It took him a few tries to unclasp his helmet, but once he had he pulled it off, set it down beside him, and leaned down. It took both hands to brace his weight and keep from falling over.

His own hair brushed against Shiro's face. Somehow, like a miracle, it was still dry. Keith's arms gave loud protest as he leaned a little further, pain searing through the muscles, but he let Red drown it out and focused on his task. His hair fluttered, and a moment later Keith heard the faint, shallow scrape of Shiro's breathing.

 _Thank god. Or whoever is out there. Thank you._ Shiro was still alive; for right now, at least.

If he was breathing, then his heart was probably beating, but just to make sure Keith pressed his fingers gently against Shiro's throat. After a few moments of nothing and the whiplash of panic, he realised that through space-worthy gloves and the frigid numbness in his fingertips, he probably wouldn't have felt a healthy pulse there. Instead, trying to suck in even breaths and calm down, Keith braced himself and dropped his weight again.

He probably leaned too much against Shiro's chest, but he tried to hold his own weight and rest his head gently against him. For a few seconds, he heard nothing, and the fear curled its fingers around his throat again, but then- _b'dum._ It was weak, and too slow, but there.

Keith couldn't get himself up again after that, though he did try. Instead, he let himself lie down beside Shiro, and took in his face again.

Little purple-red marks crept up the left side of his throat, razor thin, forked and webbed, like- _like lightning._ A gentle nudge and Keith saw the marks extended down and curled over Shiro's shoulder, reaching further down his back and ribs in a soft caress that extended all the way to his waist. He felt tears well up in his eyes again. That was from the lightning - Shiro had taken a direct hit. Not huge, since it was only a small scar - but that that was a lightning strike scar.

For a few minutes, Keith lingered on Shiro's hair again. He'd hate it, when he woke up. _When,_ because Shiro would survive this damn it, he would survive as long as Keith still drew breath. He'd hate the white hair. _But…_ But part of Keith was relieved, was so grateful. Injuries aside, the broken leg (shattered knee?) aside, the lightning strike and the odd, concave wound that looked like acid had been splashed against Shiro's right side, the wound that was a dark, sickly purple, that Keith suspected was the one he'd already had on impact - all of that aside… There were no other obvious physical changes that Keith had noticed.

It was an unreliable review, right now. Keith was still trembling, couldn't even hold his own weight, _so cold,_ his senses still all askew. Shiro wasn't even conscious, couldn't move, couldn't communicate what hurt the most. But given all that, Keith couldn't see anything else that didn't have a direct physical cause that he could name. Perhaps he'd escaped the potential havoc coalescence could wreak on his body. Maybe it would just be the white hair.

Shiro's breathing changed. It wasn't much, not enough to indicate true consciousness, but it grew heavier. Keith could actually hear it now, abrasive in Shiro's chest. On a whim, he reached out and placed a hand flat against Shiro's torso, feeling the shallow rise and fall.

Red purred in his mind, reassuring. He felt movement from her, felt her drawing together all the energy she could muster. Fire smouldered around the edges. _Red was coming._ She was moving for real, walking- running- flying towards them. She'd be here soon.

It was enough.

Keith took a deeper breath, and considered Shiro again, trying to be more objective. What else could he check? Shiro was breathing, he had a pulse. He was unconscious, and severely injured, but-

As gently as he could manage, somewhat awkwardly bracing his wrist in his other hand, elbow against the ground, still lying down but trying to keep steady, Keith reached the short distance between them and touched his fingertips to Shiro's face. Honestly, Keith wasn't sure what practical purpose it would serve - but it was what people did, right? He didn't have anything to lose. Carefully, he opened one of Shiro's eyes, expecting it to be rolled up somewhat, trying to see if his pupils responded to the light.

Involuntarily, Keith recoiled. Shiro's entire eye - even the iris, which was supposed to be dark grey, even the whites - was solid, inky black.

The whole world went blue.

For a moment, Keith didn't understand. Terror filled everything inside him that Red hadn't, sloshing against her presence. She purred reassuringly, completely unconcerned, the embers lingering at the edge igniting and creeping inwards, trying to burn out the fear.

But Keith twisted and looked up, and suddenly Red's heat was all there was in his mind; even coherent thought was burned away.

Far above them, huge and beautiful and silhouetted against the soft blue of a wormhole, the Green Lion flew.

" _Keith! Shiro!"_ crackled Pidge's voice, and Keith felt the heat of tears and he couldn't even bring himself to care. _Pidge._ He'd never been so relieved to hear someone else's voice. Not when he'd found his father. Not even when he'd drowned. " _Keith?! What the hell is-"_

Keith wasn't sure what had triggered the confused fear in Pidge's voice. Maybe he'd let out a sob. But he sure as hell knew why she'd stopped. Green's shadow fell across them, even as the nose of the Castleship broke through the wormhole in the sky, and Keith knew that Pidge finally had a visual on them. He knew how Shiro looked, how horrible and awful and broken. He could only imagine how fucked up he looked.

And Pidge was clever. Pidge was always analysing everything. She'd know that the flooded, ice-ball-filled ravine wasn't natural. She probably hadn't even needed a second glance.

The ground trembled, gently, as Green touched down. The next thing Keith knew, Pidge was tearing towards them, shouting, her voice blissfully clear, unfiltered by their comms. "Keith! Keith- oh my god- Keith, what happened? Are you- Is Shiro- What in the hell?!"

She practically dove down the slope, Green sitting down where she'd been left, and then Pidge was beside him and looking Shiro over, hands fluttering, eyes wide, trying to help Keith sit up, not daring to touch their leader. Her face was almost as pale as Shiro's hair.

"Keith? Keith what happ… Oh god." She glanced away, stared at the dead lizard animals for a split second too long. Looked around them. Looked back at Shiro, her eyes wide. Red rumbled in Keith's thoughts, and the ground shook harder as the Red Lion finally landed next to her pridemates. Unlike Green, Red remained standing, tail stiff.

Carefully, hands at Keith's shoulders, Pidge got him sitting and took his weight. She had to do it with her whole body, because physically powerful she was not, but she still did, one hand at Keith's shoulders, the other arm going around his waist to keep him steady. She'd be able to feel the tremors wracking him. She'd be able to see the tears, feel the jagged breaths, smell the lightning in the air.

Keith didn't even care. She was their family. She was _one of them._ She'd come to save them.

"... Tell me… Tell me he didn't. Please."

Fear and desperation dripped from her voice. The effects of coalescence, the stark changes in Lance and Hunk, had hit her harder than it had the others. She'd known them before they were Paladins. She could see differences that none of them could. Keith felt Red's internal flame die inside him.

 _Shiro. Shiro will be different. I'll know. I'll know like none of them will. He'll be so different._ Keith closed his eyes and let Pidge support him. He was so tired. God, he was _so tired._

He couldn't even muster the energy to shake his head. "S-sorry, P'dge…" he managed. His voice slurred, the words jagged and cracking. "I… I'm s'rry… I was too slow… My fault…"

He heard Pidge's breath catch. But the grip around his waist tightened slightly, very slightly, and Pidge's voice was firm when she spoke again.

"Shut the hell up, Keith. This wasn't your fault. This wasn't anyone's fault but _Zarkon's._ It'll be okay. We'll get him back to the Castle, he'll be okay. You'll be okay." Agreement swept through from his bond to Red, scorching approval. Pidge was right. Red said so. Keith sighed softly, relaxed against her. Next to them, above his head, he heard both his and Pidge's comms flare with static- no, voices. He couldn't pick them out.

Everything hurt. He was so cold. "... Th'nks Pidge…" he breathed, getting her attention. Her voice came, questioning, but he couldn't pick out the actual words. "Th'nks f'r saving us…"

He didn't know how long it took. The next thing Keith knew was the slide of liquid- air- cold- _breath._ Falling out of a healing pod. Hunk catching him, Pidge and Lance so close, eyes wide, smiles wider. Red purring in his chest, soothing mental licks along his soul. He knew warmth and safety then.

And if he only saw the dusty orange planet in his nightmares after that, then it would just have to be good enough.


	4. Keith, of Flame

**Alrighty hoo so. Major changes. Nothing that impacted the previous chapters (thank), BUT this is now going to be seven chapters instead of six. And also there's a reason that the title changed.**

 **Also, just for clarity: Chapters one and two = S1. Chapter three - S02E01. This chapter takes place in S3, after their initial encounter with Prince Maybelline/Lotoreál but before encountering the rift in the sky magic comet Altean ship. Also, Keith did not become the Black Paladin during that encounter. He's never flown Sable in this timeline - she told him to fuck right off along with the rest of them.**

 **Cross-posted here from Ao3. I respond to reviews here, but I don't edit this fic much like I have over there. I actually fix typos on that site and stuff. I know, it's shocking. (Same title, my name is StarlightLion over there)**

* * *

The first time Keith did it...

* * *

To be fair to herself, Pidge did feel guilty.

It wasn't that she didn't want to try and help Keith. _God,_ she wanted to help him. She just didn't know how. Nothing any of them seemed to say got through to him. He kept to himself, isolated even more than was normal - actively avoiding them. He barely spoke when they did end up together, didn't communicate on missions. Half the time he did what he was told, and half the time he explicitly did the opposite. Pidge wasn't the only one who'd caught the blistering glare, who'd seen the _rage_ in his eyes.

She was quite certain that he hadn't forgiven them for running, after they'd beaten Zarkon and found out Shiro was gone. They'd stayed for as long as they could, looked as wide as they dared roam from the Castle, searched every frequency she and Hunk could think of, worked every calibration… But eventually, they'd had to leave. Shiro was gone and they were all so exhausted they couldn't function. Lance had barely been conscious by the time he'd come back to the Castle, the Blue Lion flying herself home. Pidge had looked over the equations she and Hunk had been writing up near the end, and she still couldn't make sense of what they were trying to do.

And the Galra had been coming. They'd stolen the Empire's flagship right out from under their Central Command, of course they'd been coming. They were too worn out, their Lions drained, the Castle in need of recharge, Allura's quintessence dangerously low, missing a Paladin and their leader - they couldn't have fought. If they'd tried, the Empire would have slaughtered them. In a best case scenario.

Even just thinking about what Lotor _(Haggar)_ would have had done to them if they'd been captured alive made Pidge shudder.

But they'd left behind the only hope of picking up Shiro's trail, fled and started to lose and resorted to hiding. And Keith had not forgiven them. Pidge was starting to think that he never would. Sometimes, she wondered if they deserved it.

But Shiro was dead.

He had to be. They hadn't given up, of course not - but they'd found nothing, seen nothing, heard nothing. There was no trace of the Black Paladin. It was like Shiro had never existed. If he'd been ejected from Black somehow, then either the Galra Empire had found him first (somehow, that Voltron had missed him while searching, that he'd been there the whole time and they'd abandoned him anyway), or he'd died. Even if his Paladin armour had saved him the initial decompression or vacuum death, it would have only taken forty hours to run out of oxygen. He would have been dead months ago.

And he had to be dead. Because Pidge couldn't even contemplate the alternative without feeling sick. For his own sake, _Shiro had to be dead._

Sighing to herself, Pidge put down her tinkering and rubbed her face. It was hypocritical - she _knew_ it was. To be upset that the others wouldn't accept the obvious, to wish they'd just admit Shiro was probably dead. It felt like they were wishing a worse fate upon him every time they insisted he was alive.

But she knew it was wrong of her. Even after everything, she still refused to accept that Matt or Dad might be gone. Wouldn't even hear of it. She felt guilty, now, thinking about it. The others didn't bring it up anymore; they'd learned a long time ago that she just bit their head off if they did.

So could she really blame Keith for being so hostile? If they'd had Matt with them, and just abandoned him because they couldn't find him-

Pidge's hands clenched. They were shaking, just a little bit. No, she couldn't blame Keith. But it still didn't make it easy, trying to figure out how to approach him, trying to find a way to talk to him without making it worse.

 _I don't want him to be dead. I just don't want him to be suffering._ What the Galra would be doing to him, if they had captured him again, could only be worse. But somehow, when it came up, Pidge could never manage to just say it; she couldn't formulate the right words. It all just… came out wrong. And she sounded like she was angry with Keith for being upset and she wasn't but he was so hostile and combative and she couldn't help but snap back-

God, everything was such a mess.

She got up, leaving her work behind - although at this point, it could hardly be called work. There wasn't anything the team needed, nothing she could work on that she hadn't already. They were just excuses now. Excuses to stay curled up with Green in her hangar, and avoid Keith - avoid everyone. They all knew she believed Shiro to be dead. Nobody had said anything about it, nobody pointed out how hypocritical it was to her face, and she was grateful for it - but they still knew.

A soft purr rumbled against her thoughts, breaking the train. Green lowered her nose to the floor as Pidge approached, lying flat on her front paws just like a real cat. Low enough for Pidge to lean up and kiss her muzzle. "What am I going to do, girl?" But Green didn't have the answer, just like she hadn't the first thousand times Pidge had asked. The Lion just purred again, nudging her back; not with her metal face, because Pidge was pretty sure even a slight miscalculation would result in Pidge losing hers, but against the Paladin's mind.

This was normal. Green had become a lot more active in Pidge's mind since losing Shiro. Maybe it was just the Lions trying to compensate for the loss of Team Black - maybe it was just because Pidge spent almost all her time here these days, curled up with Green. Either way, Pidge was glad for the company. The Lion offered a deep sort of comfort that Pidge had never thought she'd find in space. It was the comfort of dozing under enormous trees in summer; the comfort of sprawling out on the roof under the stars, Matt at her side, with nothing but wonder to trouble her.

She relaxed, clambered up onto Green's paw, and leaned happily against her muzzle, closing her eyes. Inside her, Green wove through every thought and feeling; warm sun and soft grass underfoot. Pidge let Green swaddle everything else into silence, put the fear and doubt and guilt to sleep, even just for a while. For a time, Green put Pidge to sleep with them.

Green was the first warning that Pidge got.

She woke up in a startle, her Lion's mind contracting around hers. It was like being caught in a thicket, thorns digging into her skin. Letting out a pained sound, Pidge sat up and rubbed her eyes, twisting in place to put her other hand against Green's nose. She missed completely, falling flat on the Lion's leg; Green's head was lifted, in the air, facing towards… uh… they were oriented… Green was looking towards the main Lion hangar, where Black and Red had stayed.

"Green?" Pidge asked, a little disgruntled, pushing herself up again. In her mind, she pushed back against their bond, hoping Green would feel it and loosen up a little. It was like a stress headache, a constant pressure in her mind; but if anything, Green held on tighter. She gave an apologetic rumble, and the thorns eased, but it still felt constricting. The Lion didn't want to let her go. She seemed…

Green almost seemed afraid.

Frowning, Pidge got to her feet and walked up Green's leg until she could put a hand against the Lion's chest. "Hey, Green, what's up? What's got you riled, huh?" All she got in response was another low rumble, the fear mixing into a sharp prick of anger. "Hey- come on, that's not fair. I didn't do anything. Tell me what's-"

Images flashed into her mind, a russet coloured lioness, bleeding - a red blade, cutting into the beast's chest and carving out its heart. Fire. It was nothing like the normal images that the Lions communicated; nothing like the projections of action that Pidge got during battle, right before she and Green did something awesome, nothing like the memory that they'd all seen upon finding the Blue Lion. The images were jagged, unsteady and broken. They didn't move.

But Pidge's stomach clenched, because the emotion behind them was firmly attached and it made acid rise in her throat. Her Lion wasn't just afraid, she was _terrified_ \- and angry. Scared and furious and yet she stayed still, lying on her belly, head lifted into the air, just staring towards her pridemates.

Was that because of Pidge? Guilt bit into her chest again. Green spared a touch for it, reassuring, trying to erase it; _I should know better._ Green would never put Pidge in harm's way.

Okay. A little unsteady, Pidge turned and jumped off Green's leg, heading back to her work table. She had a radio on hand there, because honestly it was easier than carrying her Paladin helmet everywhere and she had no interest in copying Allura's fashion statement with transmission crystals stuck through her ears. _Ooh, I wonder if I could make it work as a nose piercing? No- Focus, Pidge._

She was almost there when the alarms went off. Harsh red light flooded the whole bay, and a startingly familiar screeching sound filled her head. For a moment, Pidge just clapped her hands over her ears and tried to think, but then the pulsing light and particular pattern of the alarm registered. _Heat danger._

No- wait- what? _Heat_ danger? The only time she'd heard the alarm go off was when Allura had nearly crazy-flown them into a literal sun! Pidge was quite damn well certain that Allura wasn't death-napping them again, but they were _floating in space._ Pidge knew the fire protocols for the Castleship, and a ship-wide heat distress was not those. Even if Hunk had managed to blow up the kitchen (or, more likely, Lance trying to 'help' Hunk), the Castle would have just sealed off the area and sucked out all the oxygen.

Oh yeah, and _that_ procedure was unpleasant as hell. Coran, with Allura's blessing, had made them all experience that one. " _Just in case."_ Pidge was pretty sure it was just some deeply hidden vein of sadism. But as much as it sucked, it wasn't strictly speaking _dangerous_ \- fire died a lot faster than people when deprived of oxygen. It was a sudden vacuum, that felt rather starkly similar to a panic attack, and then maybe five seconds of struggling to breathe before oxygen was restored. It took her a while to regain her breath afterwards, but it wasn't harmful.

The alarm squealed around her, shrieking for attention. The pulsing red was starting to hurt her eyes. _Okay._ So it wasn't some random ship fire. Either they were flying into a star corona, or something else absurd and horrible had happened. Pidge was betting on the latter. _Please don't let it be a fucking robeast._

Forget the communicator. Pidge turned on her heel and ran for the door, sparing a glance for Green on the way past. Whatever it was, she had to get up to the bridge and meet up with the others. There was a part of her that dreaded it, seeing Keith, seeing any of them. But hey, they were down a Lion and couldn't form Voltron anyway, so at least they still didn't have to face that disaster.

In one way - one tiny, sick, twisted little way - it was good that they didn't have Shiro. Nobody would question Voltron's absence when they were missing a pilot component. It was leagues better than ever trying to explain that they couldn't form Voltron because they were having a team tantrum.

But Pidge shoved all of that away, focused on the migraine building in her temples from the noise and light and the pressure of Green's mind. She had a problem right now, one that she could actually do something about.

Except…

Pidge hadn't even reached the halfway point to the door when a green and silver paw _slammed_ down in front of her. Skidding, shock like lightning crackling down her spine, Pidge managed to stop before she collided, and then turned to look up at Green. She was on her feet now, tail curled to the side - standing firmly between Pidge and the door.

"Green? What the heck, girl?! Get out of the way, I have to get to the bridge!" Indignant, almost angry - but mostly, Pidge was still in shock. She'd seen Blue and Red - and hell, even Black, before - move without the input of their pilots, but Green didn't really do that. She'd never seen Yellow do it either. She wasn't sure if it was because she and Hunk hadn't yet bonded with them as deeply as the others, or if it was because Green and Yellow weren't tempramental bitches like the other Lions-

Well. Pidge liked to think it was that second one. It made her feel a lot better about the whole thing.

But Green _snarled_ at her, and when Pidge tried to move around the enormous metallic paw blocking her way, Green stomped down the other forepaw, blocking her again. Pidge felt the wind from the movement ruffle her hair. Suddenly, it struck Pidge just how _big_ the Lions were.

She was drawing in breath to question the crazy cat again - although she made no move to walk around her this time - when the whole ship _shook._ All her breath was lost as she stumbled, and then the Castle shuddered again and she crashed into the floor, biting down on a shrill of pain. Green rumbled against her thoughts, churning. Pidge wasn't sure she'd ever felt the Lion this unhappy. Still blaring in the background, the alarm was still going, the red light reflecting a filthy orange-green off Green's body. The silver parts were bathed in red, flickering and dripping as the light pulsed around them; as if Green was wounded, bleeding out.

"What-?"

Green crouched down, the rumbling in her mind growing, and opened her mouth. She stayed blocking the door. For a moment, Pidge just stared up at her, uncomprehending. The ship shuddered and rolled under her, threatening whatever purchase Pidge thought she had.

 _Get inside._

It wasn't words, but it might as well have been. The sense of urgency from Green eclipsed the other emotions pouring off her; Green wasn't asking. This was an order; a direct order! From her Lion! If the situation weren't so fucked, if Pidge wasn't too busy being confused and annoyed and- alright, a little scared, then she might have been fascinated.

Instead, she scrambled up, skipping steps and flailing as she fought for balance, and made her way to Green's jaws. At the last moment, Green nosed forward, tipping Pidge inside her mouth - adding to the bruises she was going to get. Vertigo gripped her for a moment, and then Pidge was tossed against Green's teeth - sealed around her. It took more effort than it really should, but Pidge focused on their bond and tried to move through it, working on Green's senses rather than her own.

Thank any deity that might exist, the red light couldn't reach her here, and the alarm's screaming was just a distant whine. The soft blue light the Lions emitted was much kinder on her eyes.

Green had moved the second Pidge was secured in her mouth, bounding to the far end of her hangar, right next to the exit doors. Okay, so the hangar itself was basically a huge airlock, but there were double doors to protect them. Both sets were only open when the Lions were leaving or returning to the Castle - and even then, there was a huge separate door that came down and protected the inner half of the Green Lion bay.

They'd really been designed with the idea that the Paladins would spend time in them. It made sense, considering they were the only parts of the ship that were Lion accessible. Even to move from each colour hangar to another - or to the immense main bay, that could fit all five of them - they had to go outside.

A shimmer went through the bond, as Pidge felt Green sit down - and the emerald particle barrier settled around them.

Now that she felt safe, Pidge got to her feet and wandered up to Green's throat, the bulky cannon tilted up to allow her free access to the cockpit. There was still shaking, but it was muted by being inside her Lion, and she made it into her pilot's seat without incident.

"Okay. I did what you wanted. Now will you tell me what the hell is going on?" she asked, a little irritably, even as she fiddled with the comms that Green carried. None of them used the Lion-based radios with any frequency, given that they were pretty much always carrying their helmets while flying.

A rumble came through their link, a little regretful, but ultimately Green felt justified. A scowl crossed Pidge's face. "No, seriously, Green. You can't just cat-nap me like this, I don't care if you're a Voltron Lion. What the h-"

The images came again.

Bleeding red lioness, the blood somehow moving past the edges of her mind, spreading further - the sword - the creature's heart - the flame. And then again, hotter - the _flame._ It actually felt hot, inside Pidge's chest, like she'd slam-dunked a glass of vodka. "What-? I don't understand- Green, why are you-"

 _Fire._

And now she felt cold; icy, deathly cold. Red and fire and Lion.

It didn't penetrate the cockpit, bathed in familiar, comforting green, but on the viewscreens the red light still filled the hangar bay, throbbing like a heartbeat. Pidge could still hear the quiet shriek of the alarm, warning of impending heat death.

The Castleship thought they were flying into a sun.

"Oh god."

Frantically, Pidge got back to getting Green's comms up. She tried to bring up a video feed, but- But nobody was even in the bridge. There was no response, no acceptance of the request. Not even a rejection. "What the f- Come on, Where the hell are you guys? Allura? Coran!"

" _Pidge! Pidge, where are you?"_ came Coran's voice, frantic and scared. In contrast, relief flooded under Pidge's skin and she flopped back against her seat.

"Coran- thank fuck. I'm safe. Green wouldn't let me leave - she's got me all bundled up inside a particle barrier." And if there was a note of disgruntle in her voice; well, Green hadn't exactly played nice.

She was rewarded with a wordless exclamation of relief. " _Stay there! The Castle thinks we're-"_

"Burning up, yeah, I got that," Pidge broke in; she didn't mean to sound annoyed, but _obviously_ she knew what alarm was going off throughout the entire ship, and they had far more pressing matters than conveying that. "Have you got Hunk?" she asked quickly. She always felt bad, asking after him like he couldn't hear her - though she was fairly certain wherever he was, he was listening - but it wasn't as if he could really reply anymore.

There was the faintest note of static - a short, deliberate burst. _Oh thank god._ " _Yes, he's with us!"_ Coran assured her. " _He's nodding! Rather a lot, actually - are human heads supposed to-"_

"ALRIGHT," she stopped that sentence dead in its tracks. Partially because again, it was _not_ important, but also because Pidge had experienced enough of Coran's strange questions to be leery of where that one was going. "Do you know where the hell Keith is? Because the Castle hasn't detected any hostile craft, and I'm pretty sure Allura hasn't gone crazy and hijacked us again, so I-"

" _I most certainly have not!"_ Allura broke in, her voice high-pitched and winded, but indignant all the same. _Yeah, okay. Deserved that._ Besides, Pidge had been rambling. " _This is not my doing. I think,"_ and this time Allura's voice caught, and there was a faint echo as she came within range of Coran and Hunk's mics. " _I think this is the Red Lion's doing."_

For a split second, there was silence. Green squeezed around Pidge's mind, surrounding her completely. _No. No, it's not._ But there was another little burst of static, and then Coran's voice, raised in confusion. " _F - I - Fiend! Finite! Fixture- Ooh, no- Fields!"_

"What-?" _Wait._ F - I - could only mean Hunk was talking to them. _Uh._ Talking with his hands, she meant. He'd learned the alphabet first, of course, although the letters translated weirdly between written Altean and spoken, and Altean sign language had functionally a separate system of characters, but they'd been able to make enough connections between the two and English that Hunk had fairly easily mastered the basic alphabet. Which is how he spelt out words he didn't know the sign for yet. "No- Coran! It's-"

And that entire fucking tangent aside, _fuck_ Coran for always trying to be helpful and figure it out first. (She'd regret the thought, later, but right now speed was imperative. Not _everything_ had to be a drytting game of charades). Pidge would have staked her life on Hunk trying to spell out _fire._ Because Hunk was a goddamn Paladin and she could see the fire in her mind, and feel it trickling through from Green. It had never been more apparent that the Lions shared their own bond.

"It's Keith. He's going coalescent," Pidge barely whispered, and then she cleared her throat, trying to control the tremor. "He- I think he fought Red."

 _Bleeding lioness, crystal red sword exposing her heart. So much flame._

There was a choked sound from Hunk. It sounded strained - _pained_ \- but if Pidge had learned anything about Hunk's non-verbal noises (and by god she had), then it almost sounded like relief. For a moment, she spared a thought for curiosity: what could have possibly happened in his head to cause relief from that statement? Unless it was just understanding. _Ah._ Hunk was a Paladin. Yellow must have issued similar images and fears.

And he was still with the Alteans? Sure, Pidge had been all set to run up to the bridge before Green had physically stopped her, but she was also pretty sure that Green would have been able to pull her back without nearly crushing her into paste. A low whimper rolled through her chest, but Pidge just patted Green's console. _Nah, you're okay._

Hunk let out another noise, faint, distressed. " _L-Lan-"_ was all he managed, voice cracked and pained, but Pidge could hear the panic.

Something ugly rose in Pidge's chest, something sharp and violent. "Lance _what,_ Hunk?" she snapped, because if it was just _where the heck is Lance_ then Hunk wouldn't have bothered forcing out words, even just half of Lance's name. It cost him too much, and the first thing they'd done was make hand signs for each of them and make sure everyone knew them. If he'd just been asking after their Blue Paladin, he would have gotten Allura's attention.

That he'd tried to _say it_ spoke volumes about his fear for Lance. Which meant he knew he had cause to be afraid. Which meant he knew Lance was in danger.

" _Lance was going to talk to Keith,"_ Allura finished for him, whispered - aghast.

Which meant that if he was silent, if they didn't know where he was- Well given how well any of their interactions went these days, if Keith was going coalescent, then Pidge would bet every video game she'd ever owned-

" _We can't leave him there. I'm going to get him."_

* * *

He was losing track of the days.

Sure, Coran had long ago set up a system of light dim to emulate the Earth day/night cycle (with Allura's blessing), because only Shiro had actually ever managed with the lack of it, but-

 _Fuck._

The gladiator bot whined and sparked as his bayard sliced through it, humming with energy. _Fuck fuck fuck._ Another two dropped down out of the ceiling, and Keith had long since stopped wondering just how many the Castle had. Broken pieces of metal and fragments of robotic limbs littered the training arena; it took half of Keith's concentration just to navigate around them and keep fighting effectively.

That was good.

Because _somehow_ his thoughts always circled back around to Shiro.

No matter what he did, no matter how long or hard he trained, no matter how he tried to avoid it - even on missions, when all he was supposed to be thinking about was Red and the fight and the people they were trying to save.

 _And why the fuck wasn't Shiro one of those people?_

It would have been more than a little unfair to say that aloud to his teammates. He'd resisted the urge so far. They were looking, scouting around, but… they'd all given up. Most of them thought the Galra probably had him. _Which is why we should be looking harder!_

Pidge thought he was dead.

A snarl bubbled out of him, leaping onto one of the new robots. It spun, trying to dodge, and twirled its staff around to slap him away, but Keith sliced his sword sideways, the blade biting deep into the robot's chest. The staff cracked across his shoulders (he'd known it would) and he crumpled to the floor (he knew it was stronger than him), but Keith held onto the hilt of his bayard. It was the only thing he focused on, the pain singing down his spine (he deserved it), and the blade tore down, ripping through the gladiator bot's torso. It let out a mechanical screech, the staff's weight lifting off Keith's shoulders, and Keith lashed out again, cutting clean through the robot's legs.

Red growled in his chest, as he got to one knee and drove the sword through the robot's, but he ignored the rumble, pushed his Lion away. The second growl was louder, vibrating his whole body, tinged in rage.

Getting to his feet, relying on his senses, barely even thinking, Keith hurled his bayard with as much force as he could muster, snarling back at her. _Leave me the hell alone._ The red and white blade crunched through the second robot's chest, sinking all the way up to the hilt, the point going clean out the back.

"End program."

 _What._

Spinning, Keith faced whoever on his team had been _stupid_ enough to interrupt his training. His fingers twitched, and without taking his eyes off Lance, he walked backwards until he could yank his bayard out of the destroyed bot.

"What the fuck are you doing here, Lance? Get out." His voice was scratchy, catching in his throat. Keith wanted to blame it on sleep deprivation, on the long training and lack of talking - with any of them - but he couldn't, entirely. It was partially due to the fighting with Red, and the crying in Shiro's room at three am.

Instead, Lance walked towards him. Something glimmered in those blue eyes, and his head was tilted slightly to the side. He met Keith's glare without flinching, paused a moment, and nodded quietly. It didn't seem to be to himself; _Blue._ "Keith, you've been in here for hours. You gotta get some sleep, bud."

His voice was gentle. Like Keith was _delicate._

Inside his head, Red rumbled; it wasn't an angry sound, it wasn't the normal roar against anything that might imply she'd chosen a weak Paladin. This was a quiet growl - this was _agreement._ She batted against his mind.

"Fuck you," Keith snarled back instead, gripping the bayard tighter. "If you're so fucking worried, go do something actually useful." _Like looking for Shiro._ "Actually, how about we all go fucking do something, huh? Instead of hiding out in this godforsaken fucking star system!" Keith wasn't really sure when he'd started yelling. His heart was thundering in his chest, his breath like shredded cotton in his lungs.

The room spun as he gulped in air, trembling. Even yelling was too much exertion. He could feel it inside his skull, the heavy throbbing, the faint colour distortion in his vision. Exhaustion was not a foreign feeling to Keith; he knew what the signs were. Dehydration. He wasn't blinking, his eyes itchy and sore. Seconds kept blipping out, moments that he was missing. Just tiny fragments throughout his days.

But Lance didn't leave; he didn't even flinch. His brow knitted together, sadness and concern, and he took another step closer. "Keith-"

Tugging on Red's presence - pulling on her quintessence, like he'd been doing for weeks- for _months,_ since Shiro had disappeared - Keith lifted his bayard threateningly. "We're fucking hiding, Lance. Hiding like cowards, instead of _looking_ for our leader!" He tugged again, Red's fire filling his skin, making him feel stable. Burning and desperate, his body vibrating with power and energy, but Keith didn't feel like he might fall over with Red's quintessence singing through him. "So either give a shit about it, or _get the fuck out."_

Blue eyes glanced towards Keith's bayard. Something that wasn't quite fear, but seemed close, flickered therein. Despite himself, Keith felt the sword go down a little, guilt making him look away. If Lance really thought Keith might attack him, then the whole Voltron team was going to fall apart. If Lance was actually afraid of him, then it was only a matter of time before the four remaining Paladins grew too far apart to function.

Without Shiro, they were starting to fail. The Galra Empire was already pulling ahead. Voltron was struggling to defend everyone they'd avowed themselves to. Without Shiro, it seemed, Team Voltron couldn't hold together enough to find and save Shiro.

"Keith, I… You need to get some rest. Stop relying on Red so much. It's… You're burning out." Lance didn't meet Keith's eyes as he spoke, shifting uncomfortably, but his voice stayed soft. Earnest, almost.

There was a soft purring, a nudge against his soul that told him Red agreed. With Lance.

It was petty - and it was dangerous - but Keith didn't care. Snarling at them both, he reached for Red, chasing her when she tried to pull away, and dragged on her quintessence. She resisted, rumbling through his thoughts in anger, a bright flame that burned when he got too close, but Keith did it anyway. The liquid heat slid into his body, bubbling under his skin.

"Leave me the fuck alone, Lance," he snapped, hefting his bayard again. "Nobody asked you."

Something sheepish flashed across Lance's face, and he offered Keith a tentative smile. "Uh… Heh- actually, I drew the short straw." And he held up a short rod of what looked like glass, but Keith had learned the hard way was _definitely not glass_ because Altea had insane technology. "We're worried about you, okay?"

"Worry about yourself," Keith hissed, taking a step forward. The sword glinted in his hands, a faint red energy shimmering over it; too much quintessence, too much of Red to fully contain. It wasn't quite fire - not yet - but Keith knew it could ignite in an instant. It wouldn't be the first time, over the last few weeks, that he'd stolen Red's flame.

Blue eyes locked onto the weapon, glinting nervously, but Lance didn't step back. _Doesn't know what's fucking good for him._ Instead, Lance raised his hands. "Keith, seriously. We know-" and he glanced at Keith's face, bit his lip, slowly lowered his hands. "... I know you're afraid. I know you think… we aren't doing enough, but-"

A whistle cut Lance off, a sudden burst of heat - Keith's bayard passed within inches of Lance's head, the red shimmer erupting into flame. The heat licked at Keith's hand, but he jumped on Red in his mind, ignored the snarls as she fought back, mentally dug his fingers into her. Stolen quintessence slithered through him, hot, making his senses burn; it kept the pain of flames too close to skin at bay.

Lance let out a squeak, a tiny, high-pitched sound, and his whole body jerked back, going stiff. Something went out in his eyes.

Distantly, Keith recognised the look. There was a part of him - tiny, a weak voice locked up in the back of his mind - that recoiled from it, that howled for him to stop. He needed to put down his bayard, he needed to let Red go, he needed to find Hunk, or Pidge, or Coran. The blue, normally bright, had gone dull, Lance's expression hazy. The stiffness leached out of him, his gaze locked on where Keith's sword had sang past him, unseeing.

Unmoving. Lance didn't even blink. His breath came in silent gasps, short, shallow - panicked, despite that he stood languid and still. The not-glass rod fell from his fingers and clattered against the ground.

Some part of Keith felt the sting of fear. This was his fault - Lance was gone, disconnected. He'd once described the feeling like being lost, senses eclipsed, drowning inside his Lion. And it was Keith's fault, this time; he'd attacked, even if he hadn't made contact, even if he hadn't meant to hurt him. Even if he only really wanted Lance to retaliate, to give him a _fight_ \- something tangible to throw himself against, because the walls were worn out, the training bots fell too quickly, Red withdrew and gave in equal measure.

But he was still stealing quintessence, still pulling on Red's soul to fuel the fire that licked at his bayard. His skin felt aflame, his emotions a boiling inferno that he couldn't control. _I failed._ In the end, circling around Shiro, this was always where he returned.

Keith had failed, and Shiro was gone, and Zarkon's loss hadn't even hindered the Galra Empire at all. It had seemed to be mere days between their fight, and Lotor's first appearance.

And Lotor had _demolished_ them.

It was why they were hiding. Why Voltron had resorted to guerilla warfare, why they only showed their faces - Lions and all - when someone they'd sworn to protect called for their help.

They were always just a little too slow. There was always just little too much death. Voltron was losing ground. Voltron was failing.

 _I'm failing._

And Lance - who didn't take _anything_ fucking seriously, who couldn't even show some fucking sorrow that Shiro was gone, who still just kept fucking around and joking and pretending everything was somehow fucking okay - _Lance_ had walked in here to disturb the only measure of peace that Keith could get. Only lost in combat, dragging on Red until she cut him off completely and he found himself locked in Shiro's bedroom, only then could he find some measure of focus.

Patience was long gone.

It wasn't fair. _It wasn't_ _ **fair.**_ What the hell else had Lance expected? It wasn't as if they had a good relationship to begin with - it had only gotten worse in the aftermath. Keith wasn't done yet. He could still think, could still fight Red for her power (and win). They all knew his routine by now; he wouldn't be done until he could taste blood in the back of his throat, until he was burned out and so weak Red could lock him out entirely, until he was so exhausted he could barely drag himself to Shiro's room, let alone remember the breakdown that was sure to follow.

What had the others been _thinking?_ Sending Lance in here like it would end with anything except a fight. Except Lance was gone - lost in the ocean - and he couldn't fight back. He probably wasn't even aware of what Keith was doing. He wouldn't even know he'd been hurt until it was too late.

 _My fault, my fault._

But the guilt was consumed by flames, red quintessence overflowing as if Red was a magma chamber and Keith was a volcano on the verge of eruption, until he couldn't contain it. The flames on his bayard were a blazing, piercing orange, _dripping_ to the floor as if they were liquid. Lance stared at the air, unblinking, unmoving, barely breathing, his expression slack, eyes glazed over and misty.

And why did they have to keep pretending to give a damn about him? It was all Keith's fault - they _all_ knew it. Nobody could be stupid enough not to see where the blame fell. Shiro was gone and Keith was alone - _deserved_ to be alone. So why the fuck did they keep trying to intervene, to act like they cared?

Why couldn't they just leave him to burn?

Red was fighting him, snarling and bucking in his mind, grappling with him. It _hurt._ Even just in his mind, she was a lion - metaphysical claws tore into his soul, she snapped at him with razor sharp teeth and a bite force that felt like enough to crack him asunder. Part of Keith wished that it would.

He was the one doing this. He had alienated his team, he had cost them Shiro, he was harming Lance, he was fighting Red. She howled at him, trying to fight him off and pull away at the same time, trying to close off their bond; to stop him from taking her quintessence. But Red couldn't - it wasn't how their bond worked. For all that the Lions were the power, for all that they could defeat and destroy, for all that Red could protect Keith from, she couldn't stop him. She had chosen him. She was open to him, utterly. The Lions didn't hold back when they bonded to a Paladin - they didn't know how. Keith was quite certain they weren't capable of it. The Lions threw themselves into their Paladin with their whole soul, with _everything._ It was up to the Paladin to accept that, to understand and refine and strengthen that bond.

Red was the powerhouse, she was the Lion. But Keith had control of their bond, he was the one who could close it - or rip it open.

And if she had to fight him, if doing so shattered his soul, then so the fuck what? He had failed them - he would only fail them again. Shiro was gone, and there seemed no hope that they would find him; no hope that the others would even try. Keith couldn't take Red and leave. They were still beholden to Voltron, to protect the Coalition; Red would refuse to leave her pride.

But she would also refuse a new Paladin while Keith still lived, even if he ran, even if he abandoned everything to try and save Shiro. She would refuse, and Voltron would be cut down to three Lions, and they would fall. The universe would fall.

So if he had to fight Red until she broke him, if in the end her fire consumed him, then maybe that was for the best.

And Lance stood, utterly still. He hadn't looked up, hadn't blinked. He didn't even twitch as Keith drew more and more quintessence out of Red's soul. He just _stood there,_ a soft, vulnerable statue - gone. Present, but _gone,_ and that was Keith's fault too.

The sword clattered to the floor, the flames hissing and screaming as they touched the cool metal, before dying as they lost connection to the Red Paladin. The bayard deactivated, reverting to its dormant form. Keith barely noticed. Without it, Red's quintessence had nowhere to go, no outlet - even so small as his bayard. She was screaming in his chest, his whole body vibrating with it.

Keith stumbled as she tore at him, teeth gritted. There was that tiny part of him, a voice drowned in lava, that pled for him to stop. It was too much, he would hurt Lance (kill him), the team would never forgive him for this. There was no going back if he did this.

 _Good._

If Keith even survived it, by some miracle, then _good._ The team deserved better - and Keith wanted out. He wanted to save Shiro. He wanted to believe that he even stood a chance of doing so. And what he wanted didn't fucking matter, because they were fairy tales - a child's wish. He was never going to get it. And Lance-

 _Lance._ He couldn't even leave Keith the fuck alone. He had to be there - he always had to _be there._

He wasn't here now. But he was right in front of Keith, and that- Even that was too much.

Maybe they'd see. Maybe they'd finally understand that they shouldn't be around him. _Everyone always leaves._ Even not by choice, Keith had come to understand; everyone around him always left.

 _So fuck it. Fuck all of it. The universe can burn._

Keith was shaking, his whole body searing hot. His breath came in scraping pants, the inside of his mouth dry, pain throbbing inside his skull. It felt like his blood was boiling, his flesh melting under the onslaught of heat. Even over that, he felt the ship shudder. Lance swayed with the motion, overbalanced, fell to the floor. He didn't catch himself; Lance collapsed as the ship shuddered again, like an earthquake. He sprawled on the floor, still and weak and vulnerable. He wasn't wearing his armour - he wasn't even wearing his bodysuit. Lance was wearing his t-shirt (the one he'd brought with him from Earth), and a pair of knee-length shorts that were emblazoned with the Blue Paladin's mark, and nothing else save for the colourful little charm around his wrist that Keith had never asked about.

His skull cracked against the floor, limbs splayed out in all directions. He still didn't even blink, didn't react. The bruises would form mere minutes from now. By rights, Lance should be bundled up in his fuzzy Blue Lion blanket and guarded by Hunk and Pidge, like he always was when they caught him like this. By rights, he _shouldn't even be here._

It was hard to remember that Lance hadn't even come here to fight. It was hard to think anything anymore.

The Castle shook again, and Keith heard the roar this time, without as well as within. Red was screaming at him, fighting, loud. Letting the others know. _Traitor._ It was so hot that Keith could barely breathe, sweltering, melting from the inside out. He could hear Lance's breathing over the sound of Red roaring in his mind; a rough scrape, shallow, tearing at his throat.

It was just noise. Everything was just input, a sensory assault that only served to hurt Keith more. _Good._ Good? Maybe. Who cared anymore? There was just the heat and the battle, and Red's claws biting into his thoughts.

He couldn't even remember why it mattered so much. Keith felt like he might ignite at any second, like he was flying into a sun - or becoming one. There was more sound, now - a constant press against Keith's head, screaming and howling against Red inside him. She was snarling, clawing and biting and trying to knock him loose, dislodge the hold he had on her. With another little snarl of his own (he couldn't even hear himself, the sound was nothing over the noise of everything else, and what was that screeching?), Keith tightened his grip on her. It was like trying to ride a wild animal, while lighting himself on fire, but he dug in anyway. Everytime the claws slashed deeper into his soul, it felt like he was bleeding, but Keith didn't care. It didn't matter. Nothing mattered now except victory.

He would win. Even if it was against Red.

It was like drinking lava. It was like sumberging himself in acid, like swallowing laser fire. But Keith grappled Red down, fought her to a standstill, and instead of sink into her like he normally would, instead of step into her soul, Keith dragged her - screaming and kicking and clawing - into himself.

For a second, he thought he'd consumed a star. For a single moment, Keith was certain that Red was a sun, a supernova made manifest, and now she was enclosed within him. She was too much, his body blistering and curling into ash from the inside out - he was about to go coalescent.

But no. That was too logical - too rational. Red hadn't dropped her quintessence into him, he wasn't just overflowing. Her soul was too big, too hot, too-

 _Too._

Keith was about to die.

Maybe it was better that way.

* * *

"Princess, you can't!" Coran was the first to speak up. It didn't surprise her in the slightest; Coran would walk into the void before he willingly let Allura come to harm. Hunk took a step closer to her, eyes going wide, and shook his head, frantically signing _No_ at her. "If Keith is going coalescent, we need to abandon the Castle."

There was pain in his voice, as he said it, but his eyes were firm and stayed locked on Allura.

"What? No! I won't abandon this ship!" Allura returned, horrified. The Castle was where she'd grown up, with her father and Coran and Neylice. Little Kayn had been her best friend, and they'd snuck into every cranny of this ship. Altea had been her home, but the Castle had been her _house_ and she'd die before she'd abandon it.

It was all they had left of home.

But Coran touched her arm, his eyes deep liquid purple, and she saw the same pain reflected there. "We must, Princess. This ship cannot survive this kind of attack."

The siren was screaming in their ears. Beside them, Hunk was watching with huge, panicked eyes, his breathing hoarse. There was a sheen to his skin, a feverish glint in his gaze - something manic that Allura… vaguely recognised. She wasn't sure from where.

A _roar_ thundered through the ship; no, more than one. Two- maybe three- Allura might have counted four. Four Lions who still had their Paladins. The Black had yet to even move since Shiro's loss, sprawled out in the main hangar like a corpse, impossible for them to transport safely to her own bay.

But four roars. Next to them, Hunk flinched, and turned to look away from them, downwards. Towards the Lions.

"I…"

"Allura," Coran repeated softly. "We must put our lives before the integrity of this ship. It may be one of a kind… and a marvel of Altean engineering… and our home-" and there were tears now, not the freely given tears he offered day to day, merely an extension of the freely given emotion and passion he had for the universe. Quiet tears, glittering in the corners of his eyes, caught in his eyelashes. Silent. Even as Allura watched, one slipped and puddle in the pale blue eye-scale, holding against the seam between scale and skin. "We must protect the Paladins before this ship."

And he was right. Of course he was. It was a rare quintant that Coran was wrong. But- There had to be something she could do, anything. Even if the ship was damaged, surely even coalescence couldn't destroy it completely. Surely there was a way…

"We need the Castleship, Coran. Without it, we have no safe way to transport the Lions, we have nowhere to rest or train the Paladins. We lose wormhole capability if we lose this ship, and we cannot cross the universe in the Lions." And she was right too. If, in the end, it came to a choice she would sacrifice the Castle over the Paladins - of course she would. _In a blink._ But it hadn't come to that yet. The Castle was still intact. They hadn't broken apart.

So Allura gripped Coran's forearm and steeled herself. "Go. Take Hunk to Yellow, and then make sure the other Lions have their particle barriers raised. I suppose we… will just have to hope for Black." Sitting wrong in the back of her throat, the sentiment acid on her tongue, but they had no choice. The siren was still screaming, and Keith wouldn't wait for them. It was starting to feel hot, even this far away from the training deck.

(She had no proof he was there, of course, but they all knew his routine. It would amaze her if Keith was elsewhere).

"Princess-"

"I'll go to the bridge. It has its own shields, and I'll have my own personal particle barrier there. I can try to land the Castle - we're near enough a habitable planet. We must salvage everything we can, Coran." And she saw it in his face, that he knew there was no arguing. It wasn't levelled like an order, exactly, but Coran had known her since she was born. If he resisted, then she would pull rank.

Which meant _nothing_ out here, in the middle of forsaken space; the Princess of a dead nation, leader of a planet turned to ashes. Coran her only subject, ten thousand decaphoebs out of their time. But he pulled away and touched the back of his hand to his temple in salute. "Yes, Princess." Fear and pain in his eyes, but love and respect in his voice. "Hunk, come on. Let's get down to the Lion bays."

 _I hope that I get to see you again._

Allura spun on her heel, leaving Coran to carry out her instructions, and took off for the bridge in a dead sprint. The air was starting to swelter around her, sticking in her throat, heavy in her chest. Red light bathed the corridors she tore through; it had stopped pulsing. Allura prayed that it was because the Castle was burning its power on containing the flames and not because the heat had broken it.

Just as she reached the bridge doors, the whole ship _shuddered._ The siren squealed, the light flickering, and then everything went silent. The light remained, but Allura's ears rang in the sudden absence, deafened. _Faster, faster._

She leapt to the side as she came into the bridge, scrabbling for the wall compartment that housed the spare spacesuits. There was one in every major area of the Castle, of course; Allura would have slain for her own suit, but she didn't have time to detour in the wrong direction. Tugging and cursing, Allura hopped towards her command console, getting her legs into the suit as she went, trying to keep hold of the helm under one arm as she did.

It chafed against her nightgown as she tightened it and felt the nanoseals suction together. If she survived this, she was going to have one forsaken rash.

She yanked on the helmet, locking it into place, and then stepped up to her place of command. She wasn't planning on initiating a wormhole - stars only knew what would happen if the Castle exploded coalescence inside a wormhole - but the columns that allowed her to control the taludavs rose at her sides all the same.

She rested her hands on them, let herself breathe out. Fog smeared the bottom of her visor for a tick. Then, trying to force away the rising panic, Allura opened up her quintessence, connecting to the Balmera crystal that gave the Castle life, locking herself into the system. With a flick of energy, the cylindrical barrier closed around her.

Holographic panels flickered to life on all sides, screaming red flashes. Everything was an error. Most systems had already overheated. Navigation was completely offline. She'd be flying manually.

A flash of green caught her attention, and Allura looked away from the screen for a moment, gazing out. The Green Lion hovered before the Castle, just close enough to see, but keeping her distance.

" _...lur…? ..n yo… r me…?"_

Pidge's voice, crackling across the communications system. It cut in and out, distorted. Allura wanted to respond, she wanted to focus effort on stabilising their radio so that she could at least talk to the Paladins - find out if Hunk had made it to Yellow, find out where Coran had found himself. But she didn't dare.

Warnings flashed at her from all sides, demanding attention. Gravity was failing in the training deck. Oxygen was-

 _Oh god._

The fire protocols had kicked in almost immediately, and sealed the training deck. She knew for certain where Keith was now. The ship _shuddered._ It had failed to extinguish the flames, and now that whole level - both training decks, all facilities on that level, most of the sections above and below - all had been sealed off. It hadn't stopped it.

Of course it hadn't.

Outside, the Yellow Lion joined the Green, keeping their distance from the Castle, particle barriers raised even midflight, hovering, but watching. Facing her. _Thank the stars._ Hunk was safe.

"Okay, Allura. Let's do this. You can't stop Keith - stop trying." Tapping away, her brow knotted, Allura painstakingly overrode the Castle's protocols. _Restore oxygen flow to the affected areas, no matter how fast we lose it. Give them the best chance to survive this._

Her heart felt as if it were a breeze. Not a varga ago, she'd been curled up in bed asleep, the mice snugg-

"The mice!" she shrilled, only to feel their touch in her mind, soothing, reassuring. She looked down. They were lined up on the floor, a span away, neatly within her barrier. Relief made her knees weak enough that she dropped to the floor, reached out her hands for them. "You followed me," she said softly, as they all scurried forward at her invitation and climbed up her arms. "You clever mice. Okay, inside my helmet. Just in case." Carefully, Allura unlatched her helmet, _wasting time wasting time,_ but no, because keeping the mice safe was a worthwhile endeavour. If the bridge broke, they would need an oxygen supply just as she would. Leaving them outside the suit was a death sentence.

It took some fidgeting, to get the mice arranged in her hair and at her throat in a way that let the helm clasp shut again, but she did it. It was uncomfortable, a mouse pressed against her windpipe, little claws clutching at her scalp, but Allura ignored that. It was worth the mice's lives.

"Okay, okay… come on, Allura. You're too slow," she berated herself, getting to her feet again, surveying the screens. The ship hadn't stopped shaking and shuddering, and she was sweating under the spacesuit. The air seemed a little hazy now that she looked, shimmering. Her breath fogged bottom of her visor.

A _crack_ broke across the bridge, and Allura twitched, frantically searching her displays for the cause. When she found it, her heart stuttered, and the last of her hope drained away.

Half the starboard side of the Castle had broken away. Sirens screamed and emergency seals locked down, closing the ship off, ensuring not everything was lost to the open hull. For a moment, it was all Allura could do to breathe. _They're gone._ The whole section of ship that Keith - and Lance - was in was just… gone.

 _So what do you do? Act!_ The voice sounded like Father.

It was just in her head, but Allura twitched again and then started to work, steering the ship away. With each tick, warnings started to flicker off, errors dulling into a stable state. The sirens dulled, the lights stopped flickering.

It was still hot, the navigation was still offline; too much damage had been done, too many systems broken or malfunctioning from heat, but they were stable. And as Allura drifted the Castle towards the nearest safe planet, she turned it in its tracks, slowly, on one engine - and she saw why.

The first thing she saw was plasma. It had overtaken the entire fragmented section of the Castle - in all honesty, Allura would be surprised if any of it remained. More than likely, the whole thing had melted away.

It was like staring into a sun. For a tick, Allura was overtaken by the memory of her father's hologram, corrupted, urging her to fly them into death. It felt the same then as it did now.

The plasma wasn't a complete orb, like a star was. She could see an orb in the centre of the maelstrom, tiny and blinding white and pulsing, but light and fire and plasma surrounded it in a spiralling halo, thick waves like solar flares spinning out in all directions. Allura could see a corona, flashing. It bled flame, even though flame couldn't exist there, in the vacuum - fire spilled off the heart of the thing like a waterfall, tightening into solar energy, plasma that curled and billowed.

Allura had never been more thankful for the polarising shields that protected the bridge.

And yet, somewhere deep inside the false, fragmented sun, there was something that glinted, absolutely blinding, the glare too much for Allura to directly look at even through the solar shield. Instead, she focused the internal viewscreen onto it, trying to edge the Castle around to get a good look at it, expanding her view.

Whatever it was, it was bright and glistening, a shuddering, pulsing thing that the solar energy billowed around as if attacking, but didn't dare to touch. Only when the plasma finally did make contact did Allura understand.

A solar flare twisted on itself, and for a tick Allura could look directly, the corona consuming the bright, blittering _thing._ A heartbeat went past, and Allura thought that whatever it was, it was gone; vapourised inside a star's power.

Then, icy blue-white erupted outwards from the point of contact, and the flaming orb at the centre - _Keith_ \- moved backwards. Solar flares coiled and spiralled towards the blue-white, even as it spread, racing upwards through all contact, as if it was corrupting the plasma. The stolen energy stopped moving, and then in wake of the blue, the plasma turned to _ice._

The ice shattered, solar spirals twisting back. The contact between them vanished, even as Allura tried desperately to understand what she was seeing, how something like this was possible, if she'd already lost her mind. Maybe she was already dead.

And then she realised.

The sun- It was no sun. It was _Keith._ She'd known that already, logically, but it was so hard to reconcile the knowledge with the sight of it. The plasma event that billowed and burned before her was not a sun - it was Keith, it was the Red Paladin - it was the truth of the Red Lion's power. This was her soul made manifest. It wasn't plasma the same way that a star burned plasma and gas - those boiling tendrils of energy were quintessence. Transformed into heat and flame and death, but Red's quintessence all the same.

Quintessence could be stolen.

Shards of ice splintered away from the blue, melting even as they did, boiling a tick later. Light shimmered off the s- Keith, off Keith. Light shimmered, sloughing off in throbbing waves, but he didn't approach the ice again.

He didn't approach Lance.

And _stars_ but it made sense. If they'd been right, if Lance had been in the room with Keith when he'd gone coalescent- The Blue Lion would have had no other choice. No mortal could stand so close to coalescence and live. Returning the attack (and it certainly looked like an attack) was the only thing that Team Blue could have done.

The ice ruptured open, blinding in the light, growing outward.

And there was a flurry of sparks, wild bursts of blue light, almost drowned by the twin coalescences. Finally, Allura understood why the Castle had shaken so much.

In circles around their Paladins, the two Lions fought.

Blue was closer to Lance than Keith, moving but keeping to a relatively small area. Unwilling to leave Lance? Perhaps simply playing to her strengths. Red was faster, much faster, darting around Blue and then moving in to deliver quick attacks. Their claws met, even as Allura focused the Castle's viewscreen on them, tried to see as much as possible. Blue beams shot wildly, missing by decaspans.

 _No._ As Allura watched, she realised that Blue wasn't aggressing. The energy canon only came out when Red got too close to Lance, otherwise she stayed defensive. Protecting herself, protecting her Paladin. Red's attacks showed no sense of coordination, streaking around as fast as possible, constantly in and out of sight. Blue bursts of energy and eruptions of lava and flame came from her mouth in equal measure, flashes from her tail canon lancing the empty space in every direction. Even as she watched, Allura felt the Castle absorb one and shudder, shrilling protest alarms around her.

But Allura stood transfixed. She'd never seen Lions fight. She hadn't really believed it possible. When Zarkon had… Black had rejected him instead of be turned on her pride, had allowed herself to be sealed in the bowels of the Castle.

And _this…_ This even without their pilots.

Pidge's voice rang in her mind. " _I think he fought Red."_ Fought Red? Allura hadn't been entirely sure of the implications of that, at the time. Hunk's horrified, choked response had been enough to inform her what the Paladins thought of it, but she hadn't truly understood.

Keith had fought her? But they had gone coalescent.

And Red was attacking Blue.

Keith was attacking Lance.

 _Keith had fought her._ For quintessence? Had Keith somehow forced coalescence instead of the other way around? Allura couldn't even imagine the kind of discipline and mental power that would have taken, to overpower a Lion. It didn't seem possible.

The mice squeaked quietly in her helm, pressing against her, and flickers went through her mind. Not quite words, just the intent of them. She understood.

Keith had the discipline. Allura wasn't sure about power - but the mice were right. If Keith had one thing in abundance, it was _anger._ And the amount of anger it would have taken to overpower his Lion, to force coalescence even with Lance in the room, even on board the Castle, to endanger them all so perilously-

Allura felt some of that anger. It went so at odds with what she knew, with what Keith had proven over and over - he was loyal, he was on their side, he would risk his life for them. He was Paladin. She couldn't fathom all this. Attacking Lance. Nearly killing them all.

Red shot at Blue, jawblade shimmering to life, scored a direct hit on Blue's shoulder before the bigger Lion slammed a paw into her and threw her clean away, sparks flying. Allura couldn't hear the roars from here, but she felt certain they were there, hovering in the nothing. The sun- Keith pulsed behind the Lions, the billowing corona expanding and then contracting in, like a heartbeat.

This time, Blue went after Red. Claws met, and they tumbled through space, towards their Paladins - past Lance, towards Keith. The corona touched Blue, and the entire Lion jerked. Ice poured from her mouth in an endless stream, arcing across them.

It struck the centre of the hollow sun.

Red jolted back, and the lava came. There was no force behind it, quintessence turned flame flooding from the Lion's mouth as if it were vomit and not an attack. One by one, the solar flares flickered into blue-white light and then froze, and fractured, and splintered away. On Blue's other side, the ice stopped growing, it's surface like a storm in motion, constantly freezing and melting.

The Red Lion twisted away from the Blue, wounded, streaks of fire dotting her path as she flew straight for her Paladin. By the time Red reached him, the corona was dead, the white orb of plasma surrounding Keith was starting to dim and darkness split its surface like shadows. Lava no longer came from Red's mouth, and she dove headfirst into the disintegrating sun without hesitation, plasma clinging to her body and setting her aglow.

At the same time, Blue shot away, straight towards the ice ball. She didn't wait for it to break - she dug in her claws and broke it herself, huge shards flying off in every direction until- Blue bit into it, shaking her head, cracks spreading like spiderwebs-

The whole thing fell to pieces, spinning away from Blue, but her jaws remained sealed shut.

Keith's sunlight finally died. The ice that remained, floating in the void, winked quietly, catching flashes from the Castle or the Lions or the distant host star of this system, but otherwise invisible.

For some time - too long, even as Allura slowly unclasped her helmet and the mice spread out across her shoulders - there was nothing.

The Yellow and Green Lions drifted closer to their kin, slowly. Hesitantly. When they got too close, Blue turned towards them, and then she went still. The lights in her eyes dimmed, and her body curved. Her mouth remained sealed.

Yellow took the cue and moved in to get hold of her, claws gently curling around each shoulder. He drifted back towards the Castleship, slowly, keeping his distance.

When Green got too close to Red, her tail curled, a thin bolt of ionised blue energy shot past the Green Lion's face - and Red turned tail and fled. She went straight for the closest planet (the one they were going to land on anyway), but she moved too fast for them to follow. In a blink, she was gone.

And Allura had to pull herself together. They had to land. The Castleship was badly damaged, half shut down, an entire section missing. They had to find out if Black was still there - if the hangar was even intact - and find her if not. They had to make sure the people they had were okay.

They had to see if Lance was still alive.

Allura couldn't even imagine a world in which he was. He'd been encased in ice, burned out with Blue's quintessence, lost to the void of space. Fought his fellow Paladin.

 _The Lions were piloting themselves that whole time._

It didn't seem real. None of it seemed real.

When the Castle had been landed, when Green and Yellow and Blue were safely set down nearby, when Pidge and Hunk tore past her without even a pause, going straight for the Blue Lion, for Lance - Allura still didn't think it felt real. Where the Castle had been torn apart, the hull was _melted_ away.

Even when she spotted Coran follow Hunk out of the Yellow Lion, it didn't feel real. It felt like a nightmare, like Allura was unsteady and spectral, as if any wrong movement might wake her up, or send the whole universe spinning.

It wasn't until Coran reached her and put his arms around her, until she felt his warmth and the tightness of the embrace, until her breath caught and she realised that she was crying - _sobbing,_ shuddering and clinging to Coran right back - only then, did it finally seem real.

The Castleship was broken. Lance might be dead. The Lions had _fought_ each other. And Keith - just like his brother - was gone.

The Red Lion gone with him.


	5. Allura, of Ice

**Okay, I'm back. Back again. Life got in the way, you know the drill by now I'm sure. But I smashed this out when I got a couple of days off - WHOO writing that halfbreed is difficult for me. Anyway, sorry for the delay. As always, cross-posted to AO3 (where it is much better edited I promise). Enjoy!**

 **NOTE: 'Dryte' is pronounced [dright], like bright; 'drytting' is the equivalent derivative form (like 'fuck' and 'fucking'), but it's pronounced [dritt-ing], like spitting. Think of them as the Galra equivalent of 'shit' but with an ever so slightly different connotation.**  
 **Also, a dolj is a tiny dog-like creature with six legs that I made up on the fly. It's cute and Ezor wanted one for a pet. They just come with the slight problem of acid-like venom and the ability to turn practically invisible. Is it any wonder Ezor wanted one?**

* * *

The first time Allura did it, she lost.

* * *

It was tense, inside the Green Lion.

Keith stayed near the back of her cockpit, sitting in silence. She felt his eyes on her, occasionally - the same gaze since she and Coran had tracked him down, on the other side of planet D6-48Y. Stricken, guilty, uncertain of himself. Restless, angry.

He'd been half dead, when they'd found the Red Lion and dug Keith out of her mouth. Hair scorched off, clothes burnt to ash. Honestly, the surprising part wasn't how wounded he was; it was that he'd been breathing at all. Pidge had resigned herself to searching for a corpse.

That thought was enough to make her glad that Keith was in here with her. It sat funny in her gut, the gratitude that her friend - _her brother_ \- was alive. Next to it simmered the rage and indignation, the absolute inability to understand why Keith had attacked Lance. And even that didn't quite sit right, because on some level, Pidge did understand. She understood feeling so hopeless and helpless that Keith had just thrown in the towel and hurled himself into chaos. Given in to the worst of his impulses, set fire to all his bridges. Let the consequences be what they may.

It didn't make it any easier, to swallow the betrayal. It didn't make it easier when Lance couldn't be left alone with Keith anymore, could barely be in the same room. Not because any of them believed Keith would attack him again - especially given the state of his mind - but because despite not really remembering the event, being near Keith triggered him.

The number of episodes Lance had suffered since the Castle's destruction was… distressing.

And yet, Pidge couldn't bring herself to exclude Keith like the others. Hunk wasn't obvious about it, of course, but he spent almost all his time with Lance - and how could she blame him? Lance had only even started being able to walk again two weeks ago. It was a miracle of Altean technology that he was functional at all, if a lot quieter these days. Pidge wouldn't have believed it of herself, but she actually missed his incessant chatter. Everything felt… bigger, without it. Emptier.

Allura hadn't forgiven him. Pidge wasn't sure she ever would; they were doing their best to repair the Castle, but it was Altean architecture and they had neither the manpower nor the resources to do it. For the most part, they were stranded.

And it wasn't just Team Voltron that was suffering for the loss. The entire resistance had started to crumble without them. They just couldn't respond to distress calls unless they were practically on top of them. Lotor was relentless; in their absence, the universe was at his mercy. And it was _so hard_ to remember that they'd already been flagging before Keith blew up their ship.

But Pidge tried. Because she understood the kind of mindset that Keith must have been in. Because it was the truth - Keith hadn't been the cause of their downfall, just the final nail in Voltron's coffin. Because he sat back there, silent, his hair growing back in dark patches, wearing his Blade gear instead of his Paladin armour. The mask was down, but he kept the hood up - at a glance, Pidge almost couldn't see the bubbled skin that curled down the left side of his face, angry red and purple.

The burn scars extended down across his whole body, weaving over his chest and stomach, dappling his back and legs. Without the Castle's healing pod, Pidge wasn't sure he would have retained the use of his right hand. She remembered how he'd looked when they'd finally gotten Red's mouth open to get at him. How whatever skin was left had been sticky black, his body slick with blood and plasma. She'd thought they'd lost him too.

Coran was easier on Keith than Allura or Hunk. Maybe it was because they'd been the ones to find him. The others had known he was alive before they got him back. They hadn't had to touch him, feel the death shroud that clung to him. They'd barely checked in on him while he and Lance were in the healing pods.

Maybe that was it.

And that was why Keith was in Green with her. In all honesty, Pidge was only even on this mission because she'd been outvoted. Both Hunk and Lance had sided with the Alteans, when they'd picked up the distress call. If it had been any further away, she would have fought harder against it - but Coran swore up and down that it was Altean in origin. It was close enough to get to in the Lions, albeit after a two-hour flight.

"Thank you," came from behind her, and she jumped. Keith's voice was scratchy, these days. Pidge wasn't sure how much of it was damage from coalescence, and how much was just disuse. Letting go of Green's flightwheels - they were just flying straight right now anyway - she twisted in her seat and looked back at him. He glanced up to meet her gaze. _He looks so sad._ Which was her normal response, but she couldn't help it. "For not leaving me behind," he clarified.

And there was that note in his voice, genuine and open. It was still… strange. That Keith was so unguarded with them. None of them had asked about it yet - Pidge was pretty sure that she was the only one who cared enough to ask, right now. It was more than just the attack, the meltdown that nearly cost them everything. As far as they could tell, Keith was… fine. Sure, he'd been wounded and he would carry the scars for the rest of his life - Pidge wasn't sure he'd ever get that eyebrow back, or how evenly his hair might eventually grow back - but otherwise, he seemed… normal.

In fact, if anything, he seemed to have let down his guard. As if he trusted them more than he did before. Even when the guilt was naked on his face, or he let Allura make him leave, there was no sign of the walls he'd put between them.

Pidge bit her lip, and then spun her chair. They were just flying straight, Green could handle that. The Lion purred against her thoughts.

"... You're not at a hundred percent yet, but you're still a good fighter. We might need you," she replied. It was too clinical a response, she knew it was - but he flashed her a tight smile. He couldn't smile very widely yet, or it pulled painfully on the still-healing scars, but he gave them more freely. "Besides, I… I couldn't just leave you behind with Red."

And Keith looked away, the smile giving way to pain.

Because that was why Keith was in Green with her. Coran had refused to be left behind - and Allura wouldn't have allowed it - but it wasn't an issue of space; it was an issue of matchmaking. None of them had really felt comfortable letting Lance pilot Blue on this mission, but in the end he and Allura had wound up paired together. Coran was with Hunk in Yellow.

If Lance had been taken off pilot duty, they would have had to travel three per Lion. Lance would have gone with Hunk, and Allura probably with them; Pidge would have taken Coran and Keith. But while Coran didn't act like the others, the idea of he and Keith sharing confined space for at least two hours had been so quietly rejected, Pidge wondered if it had even been fully voiced at all.

So it was just her and Keith. Because Pidge had steadfastly refused to let him be left behind, despite Allura insisting someone needed to stay and guard the broken Castle. Everything might be fucked up, and Keith might barely be a Paladin right now, but he was still their best melee combatant (without Shiro); he was still… part of Team Voltron. However tenuously.

"... It's my own fault she won't talk to me, Pidge." Yeah. It was. And it was his own fault that Hunk wouldn't either, that Lance could barely look at him. But she couldn't bring herself to make it worse. If he hadn't been remorseful - if she'd thought he actually wanted to hurt them - it would have been different, but Pidge knew better.

Pidge sighed, unclipped her helmet and set it in her lap. Out of habit, she slipped Matt's glasses out and set them on her nose. "Yeah, so what? It doesn't make it suck any less." Pidge couldn't even imagine Green refusing to talk to her, locking her out. "... Look, I do have questions though. Okay?"

And maybe she was finally ready to ask them. It was just them, bathed in soft green light; safe from the others.

Keith nodded, looking up at her again. His expression was open, unguarded. He looked… like Lance.

Nope. Pidge looked away at that, fiddling with her helm. "What… do you remember?" Pidge hadn't ever gone coalescent - she planned on _staying_ that way - but from everything the others had told her, from talking to Lance, it was apparent that the answer would probably be 'not much'.

Keith tilted his head slightly, considering the question. Before, Pidge would have been waiting for a half answer; 'not much' fit the bill perfectly. It was personal, and traumatic, and Keith would have hedged away from answering her, even if he avoided lying. It was just the way he was - he hadn't liked to talk.

"About… what I did? I… It's… blurry," he admitted. He almost sounded embarrassed. "I remember training, and… Lance coming to talk to me." Guilt, now, saturating his voice, like tar on gravel. "He asked me to slow down. To stop… relying on Red." A pause, and then he huffed out a bitter laugh. "He said I was burning out."

Pidge shook her head. _Of course_ Lance had decided to use that phrase. Hindsight and all. "And that made you go coalescent on him?"

"No! Not…" Keith's shoulders tightened, but he stayed sitting facing her, didn't try to pull away. "... I was… so angry. I don't know, Pidge. I just wanted him to go away. Or fight me. _Something._ I… I kept thinking, _It's my fault Shiro's gone._ Which is ridiculous, I know, I just… didn't understand why you didn't see that." But… he sounded just as confused by the sentiment as Pidge felt.

"How the fuck could that have been your fault?" Bitingly, more so than she'd meant. But Keith just flashed that sad little smile at her again. Didn't look away.

"I don't know. I guess I wasn't thinking straight. I was… scared that you'd all leave me too." Shaking his head, absently reaching up to put his hood back. Pidge tried not to react to that; he was… sensitive about the damage done to his face. "I know you wouldn't. Not normally. I really don't know what I was thinking, Pidge. You guys are my family." He stopped, suddenly, frowning, and then offered her a stricken look. "I never told you guys that, did I? I never said… You're my family, Pidge. Team Voltron. I love you guys. I… I'm sorry I hurt everyone."

 _Are those… tears?_ Not that she'd never seen Keith cry before, but it had only been the once.

Shifting in her seat, Pidge felt her heart sink further. She couldn't bring herself to just… _forgive_ the mess Keith had made - it felt like betraying everyone else - but she couldn't lock him out either. "Yeah. We're all family."

It wasn't like she could deny it. They'd been out here for too long, fighting the Empire… Honestly, Pidge wasn't even sure how long it had been. She could probably figure it out, and maybe she would when they got back to D6-48Y, but what mattered was that it had been a _long_ time. She'd be lying if she said she didn't think of them all as siblings.

"... It felt like I was on fire," he went on, sighed out, relieved. "I mean- Before. I guess I… Lance was right. I used too much of Red's quintessence. I'd been… doing it for weeks," he admitted softly, lowering his gaze, fiddling with the Marmoran knife in his lap. "I wasn't trying to hurt you guys, I just…"

"... Wanted it to stop."

He startled, looking up at her with wide violet eyes, but despite the shame that filled them he didn't look away when he nodded. Pidge let out her breath, blustery, and ran a hand back through her hair. _He'll even just admit it. That he used coalescence to try and…_ Well. She doubted it had been so specific as killing himself. But he probably hadn't cared that it might.

"I remember Red fighting me." Whispered, now. "Lance… got lost. Before I- I mean, I swung my sword at him. I didn't hit him! I wasn't trying to hit him." Almost frantic, but Pidge nodded quietly - she believed him. Why would he lie? And maybe she wanted to believe he hadn't been trying to hurt them. Maybe it was too painful to contemplate any other alternative. "But it was on fire, and he got lost. And I just… I dunno. I kept taking her quintessence. After that, all I remember is how… hot it was. Red's too much for me. The next thing I remember is coming out of the healing pods."

And Pidge had been the only one there. At the time, it had been out of a sense of duty; she'd helped save him, helped haul his body back. He couldn't be left to wake up alone. Not only was it cruel, it was dangerous. She wouldn't let the memories of how they'd found him haunt her for nothing.

Now, she was grateful to her past self. Keith was wrong, and he'd fucked up - but… he didn't deserve abandonment. She sighed.

"You're… different. You know? I don't think you'd have told me all this before. And you shouldn't do it just because you feel guilty, okay, because I-"

"What?" Genuine shock, in his voice, and it was enough to silence her. "No- Pidge, no. I'm not… I do feel guilty, of course I do. But I… Why wouldn't I tell you? I trust you. We're Paladins; we're family. We don't have anyone else."

For a split second, that didn't strike her as odd. It had never been said aloud, but it had been obvious in the way Keith threw himself into Voltron right from the start, from the way he never contributed when Earth, or their families came up. He'd never said it to their faces, but Pidge had known. He didn't have anyone else. She suspected that, for most of his life, it had just been Shiro. Which meant it made sense that he'd been so distraught about Shiro's loss.

 _Shiro. Ah, shit. Okay, just… say it straight, Pidge._

"Listen, Keith… I know it's all fucked up, okay, but… I don't want Shiro to be dead. You know that, right? I want him to- come back and be the Black Paladin and… tell me off for swearing." She was watching, as she spoke, trying to make sure that he understood - and suddenly, she wasn't sure that she did at all. There was pain in his eyes, but under that there was confusion. "I… I just don't want the Galra to have him again. They'd torture him." Her voice cracked, so she stopped.

But now, Keith was frowning, sitting back against the wall of Green's cockpit. Confused. "I know that, Pidge. I…" and something vague crossed his gaze, just for a moment. Something hazy, something that reminded her of Lance. "I guess I… never let you explain that before. I don't… I'm sorry. I know that you miss him too. He's our leader - we all miss him. You guys love him just as much as I do."

 _What?_ Oh, they all loved Shiro, no doubt - but as much as Keith? Pidge wasn't so sure about that. And she was sure as shit that Keith knew that.

"Hey… Pidge?"

"Yeah?" she offered, distracted, trying to figure it out. Was this the coalescent effect? Had it… taken away all the walls Keith had put up, somehow? This wasn't just contrition - he was tangibly different. Open, trusting.

He glanced away. "The Galra haven't… captured him before. I mean, I'd remember that - if they'd caught one of us."

Her thoughts stuttered to a stop.

"... What? Wait- _What?"_ He frowned again, slightly, studying her - not understanding her indignation. "What the fuck- Keith. What the hell are you talking about?"

He shifted, confused, nervous. "I would remember if the Galra captured one of us. I mean- I know they caught Allura that one time." And guilt, again, a flicker in his voice. "But we went to rescue her."

And there wasn't the deep bitterness in his voice as he said that. It was… calm. Factual. _Of course they'd rescued her._ Like there had been no other option, not drawing comparisons between her rescue and Shiro's lack of. It had been snarled at them before.

"... He was with Matt!" she all but shouted. Not trying to shout- shit, shit. Keith flinched. "He-" _Control your voice, Pidge. That wasn't his fault._ "That's how we all ended _up_ out here, Keith! We got Shiro back from the Galra, before we found the Blue Lion. I- He has a Galra _arm!"_

She didn't understand. Was Keith just fucking with her? It didn't sound like something he'd do, not before and especially not now. But it had to be _something_ because-

The haze flickered across Keith's face again. It lasted longer - ten seconds. Twenty. Not lost, not quite like Lance, on second look; he frowned, gaze lowered. Like he was trying to remember something from a long time ago. Thirty seconds. Keith gave up, looked back up to Pidge with confused - but clear - eyes, gave a helpless shrug. "... Are you okay, Pidge?"

 _Oh, you did not just-_

"Are _you?_ You better not be fucking with me, Kogane, I swear to god-"

"F- Pidge, what are you talking about? I- Really, I don't understand."

She stared at him. "... Keith. Shiro has a Galra arm." His eyes shut off. Just for a moment, this time, just a flash - and then he nodded slowly.

"Yeah, I know."

 _And yet you- What, just fucking_ ** _forgot?_**

…

Wait.

 _No. Fucking no._

"... Keith… How… How did Shiro get that arm?"

"I-" Keith broke off. He was looking at her, but for a good ten more seconds, he wasn't looking at anything. _This_ was far too similar to Lance for Pidge's comfort. She was almost on her feet by the time he took a sharp breath in and looked away. "I don't know. He's always had it."

He sounded troubled, but… there wasn't any doubt in his voice.

"... Keith… How much do you remember?" It wasn't until Keith frowned at her and opened his mouth to respond that realised she'd asked that question already. "Not- Not about… that. I mean… Ah fuck- What's the _first_ thing you remember? Like, the oldest - from… when you were a kid?"

This time, he went blank for a full minute. Pidge was on her feet, feeling Green drift to a stop as she left the pilot seat, standing close enough to Keith to reach out and put a hand on his shoulder. She didn't, wary of how he might react, but she hovered close.

He jerked in surprise when he realised she was there. "Fuck-! Pidge- Damn, you're sneaky," he huffed, glancing between her and her seat. "I don't see why that's relevant, but the first thing I remember…" and he thought a moment, normal thinking, while Pidge backed up a step. Then, he shrugged. "The first thing I remember is Red. Which makes sense," he added firmly, as if still convinced something was wrong with Pidge. _With me!_ "Because I'm- I… was her Paladin."

Uncomfortable. Technically, he still was - but she wouldn't talk to him, refused to let him fly her. Hunk had been forced to carry her back to the Castle in Yellow's claws. They weren't sure she'd ever let him fly her again. The others weren't sure that was so wrong.

Pidge couldn't share the opinion, no matter how badly Keith had fucked up. _God, I'm terrible at grudge-holding._ It must be awful, to be able to feel Red and not touch her.

"... What about Earth? The Galaxy Garrison? Looking for Blue, the desert? Anything?" Almost desperate. _But it makes sense._

He offered her a quizzical look. "What's the Galaxy Garrison? Is that one of your… 'memes'?"

 _He doesn't remember._

But he remembered Red.

And it _made sense_ if he didn't remember before - the changes. It made sense if he couldn't remember whatever had happened to him that made him so wary, if all he knew was Team Voltron being together. Of course he'd trust them. If they were everything he'd ever known.

"... I…"

Sound burst from her helmet, and she jumped. Barely missed hitting her head on the ceiling. Inside her chest, Green rumbled softly, and gave a little tug. _Right._ They were on mission. They had to keep moving.

 _"Pidge! I swear on every star, if he's-"_

"I'm _fine,_ Allura," Pidge broke in, clipping her helm back in place as she settled in her seat, glasses stowed away. She turned back to the viewscreens, got Green back into motion. "Keith's fine too." It was a little sharper than she meant; maybe she was being passive-aggressive. It wasn't like she blamed Allura for being angry - but assuming that he'd hurt her, inside her own Lion, in the middle of fuck nowhere, when he'd been nothing but contrite and accommodating and very clearly wasn't their _enemy_ was a step too far for her. It felt too much like the blind hatred and guilt she'd assigned to every Galra alive (and by extension, Keith as well) when they'd first hooked up with the Blade.

Allura spluttered over the comms, and there was a burst of static that she knew was Hunk. Coran, probably rightly, decided to interrupt before they could exchange anything else scathing. _"You stopped moving."_

"Yeah, I… Don't worry about it, just had to check something. We're all fine here." She didn't even know how to explain. She didn't know enough about the extent of the damage to Keith's memories - what was gone, exactly, how it intersected with what remained. She didn't even know if it was physical damage to his brain, or just trauma, or if it was caused explicitly by coalescence. Or some combination of the three. Pidge wouldn't have even known where to begin, while they were spaced out across three Lions, on their way to a mission. And Keith was right there, listening silently to the radio chatter. She shouldn't expose him like that without consent.

 _Although, I'm going to get consent, because they have to know._

And considering his new mindset, Keith would probably agree.

Okay, it was still weird.

 _"Alright. Well, we're approaching the source of the Altean signal. Everyone ready for battle!"_ Coran warned them. Behind her, Pidge heard the faint singing whine of Keith's mask going up. Presumably, the hood went up with it.

She tried to put everything else aside. They were on mission. They might have to fight. Until they were home, they needed to shelf their domestic. _Fuck me. Green, what the hell did I do to deserve this?_

The Lion just purred back, teasing. Pidge must have done something amazing to deserve her. _Well, shit. You right._

The source of the signal, when they found it, was impossible.

And even more impossible, the Lions breached it.

* * *

Sometimes, the universe just spread its legs for him. It was just too drytting easy.

He hadn't even had to try. For weeks, he'd been pouring over it with Acxa, trying to figure out how to locate the Paladins of Voltron, draw their attention to the anomaly, convince them to draw out the comet, all without letting them know he was anywhere near it. He'd been expecting to have to hide his lightcruiser and its small contingent of fighters from the Altean ship that served as Voltron's base of operations.

Instead, while Ezor was on patrol for the area, he'd received word of three Lions making an approach. Just three. No flagship in sight.

By the time he'd even arrived from the neighbouring star system, they'd breached the rift, and left themselves wide open for a return ambush.

It was _too easy._ If Lotor hadn't known better, he would have said they were setting him up.

"Ezor," he said suddenly, sitting back comfortably in his fighter while they waited. "You said the Lions went through one at a time, right?"

 _"Yup! They tried to go together, but they got turned into spinners when they tried."_ Laughed across their comms, and suddenly Lotor had the starkest mental image of his General twirling across the bridge of the lightcruiser, where she (along with Narti and Zethrid) were currently commanding it.

Unfortunately (or… maybe not, Lotor wasn't certain), that image came from memory, and not projecture.

"So, it's safe to say that they will _return_ one at a time as well, then?" he posed, tapping his fingertips against his thigh.

 _"That would seem the logical conclusion,"_ Acxa replied on Ezor's behalf. Lotor couldn't decide if she just wanted a coherent answer, or if she just wanted to forestall an Ezor prediction. They'd heard Ezor Predictions. Sometimes, they went on for doboshes at a time. _"So shall we take the simple way through?"_

"That's what I was thinking, yes," Lotor said through a smile. "Take hostage the first Lion to come through. Let the others react as they will."

 _"And if they attack?"_ Zethrid asked, but there was a sense of relish in her voice. She'd so far been barred from engaging in all-out combat with the Lions. There were many reasons Lotor had thus far refused - not in the least of which was that Voltron provided a nice, distinct enemy for the Empire to fight; and focus on. On top of which, Lotor wasn't actually certain that they could take out the Lions, if they pushed to their limits.

All the same, Lotor shrugged. "If they attack, then we defend ourselves."

Zethrid crowed over the comms, and started barking orders to the combatants under her command. Trigger happy she may be, but Lotor left her to it. There was a reason, after all, that he'd placed her in charge of his military endeavours. The woman had a knack for strategy that even Lotor had trouble keeping up with.

 _"Sire,"_ Acxa began, drawing his attention. _"Are you certain? Engaging them with a single lightcruiser - even if they only have three of the Voltron Lions - seems… risky."_

Lotor considered it. It wasn't as if he hadn't already, but Acxa was his second-in-command - when she voiced concerns, he always reminded himself to listen. Assuming he knew better is how he'd become his father, after all. "We should have a hostage to mitigate that risk. Unless you believe they'll attack anyway?"

In all honesty, Lotor was quite certain that two Lions could take out his lightcruiser. Oh, he and his generals would be safe. The staff and slaves on the ship (however few that number might be) would likely perish if the remaining Lions attacked regardless, but if they succeeded in holding the first hostage, then they would lose a Paladin for their efforts. He was willing to take a gamble on their character; they would not sacrifice one of their own just to destroy one single lightcruiser.

Acxa made a soft sort of sound. _"No, Sire. I doubt they would risk a Paladin. Not for us. Perhaps for you."_

Lotor laughed. "True, Acxa - but they already know they can't outfly me." He had made sure to prove that to them. The Red Lion had come close, to be honest, but in the end Lotor had still come out ahead. "Ezor, what colours did you say came through?"

He hadn't forgotten. _Blue, Yellow, Green._ But he was making a point; even if Acxa wouldn't appreciate it. It wasn't outright directed at her - Lotor wasn't one for such cruelty. Just edged enough so she knew he was teasing her. _"The big Yellow, the not-so-big Blue and the- Hey, Lotor? Why is one of the legs smaller than the other? I mean, wouldn't that just-"_

"Ezor, please," Lotor broke in. Laughing, not in the least because that was a valid question, but - well, there went his entire bit.

 _"Oh, right. And the Green one. So small."_ She pronounced the word as if it were spelt with an 'o' instead. A habit that, Lotor had come to understand, was something of an endearment to her.

It seemed a bit strange, even to him, for Ezor to hold such an opinion about their enemy, but it was hardly the strangest thing he'd heard out of her. He shuddered to think about the stealth dolj fiasco.

The time passed slowly, while they waited for the Lions to emerge from the rift. It seemed like whole quintants had gone by, although Lotor knew rationally that it was only perhaps a varga or two. All the same, he was relieved when light flared up from the rift, and the Altean ship shuddered. Refining his plan for getting inside the first Lion through had only taken half a varga. The rest was improvisation. It always was, in a real plan.

"Acxa, be sure to bring my fighter back to the cruiser," Lotor said aloud, drifting closer to the blinding light. He was certain she offered a response in the affirmative, but Lotor wasn't listening. He didn't need to hear her to know she would obey.

Solar shields flared to life across his viewscreens, the light tinted into a dull orange as the rift dilated. Even then, the light was bright enough that Lotor felt his eyes narrow. Oh, what he'd give to have pureblood eyes at this moment. For a moment, he glanced away, letting the light ripple out - and then it dulled again. It almost felt like a physical presence eased.

Lotor didn't wait for the rift to flare up again. He shot forward, focusing on the Lion that had come to life back this side - it span out lazily, its eyes glowing dim gold, not yet moving. Luck was on Lotor's side this quintant. The drain of going through on their own, instead of as the Voltron whole, must be enough to knock them out temporarily. _But that makes them defenceless._

It wasn't without risk, of course. He was still going in blind, had never seen the inside of a Lion in person, could very end up inside a chair or a console or a person. None of them were attractive options.

But he was good. He'd been trained by the best - he'd had to be good to survive.

"Okay, I'm going in. Be ready to fire on the others." Barely even listening to himself, focusing on his target. The tail twitched, blue paws moved in slightly, the body curling. Lotor had always known that the Lions were big, of course, and he'd fought them enough times to have a reasonably realistic idea of their mass - but somehow, drifting his fighter sideways around the Blue as it woke up, it seemed… bigger.

Intimidating. Menacing.

Anticipation curled in his stomach like fear. But their course was set, their objective was crucial. They needed the comet, and the Lions would undoubtedly come back with it. Lotor had to move _now,_ before the Blue Lion woke up completely and any chance of doing this safely vapourised.

For a moment longer, Lotor studied the Lion as intently as he could, mapping the dimensions, focused on its head. He only had rough estimations, but hopefully, if he wasn't too unlucky, they would be enough.

His eyes closed. In the jagged shadows behind them, the imagined dimensions of his target flickered in white, like the Lion's skeleton. An inhale - short, held high in his chest - and Lotor dug into himself, opened the paths that had been once flayed, feeling it coil under his skin like poison.

Purple light flowed out from him, weaving through the short lilac fur, pale green curling around the edges. It grew brighter, eclipsing the distant white pulsing of the rift, and then it turned to smoke and filled his every orifice.

A short, pained cry escaped him.

The whole universe twisted inside him, narrowing until it felt like it was blood and not light seeping through his skin. Then, it blew out around him, gone almost as fast, coloured smoke fading into nothing.

In the first half second, he stood up as straight as he could manage, breathing in again, trying to gauge how he'd landed, whether he'd calculated right. It was meant to be intimidating, to push out the searing sensation that lingered under his skin, to ensure he didn't give the Blue Paladin the necessary pause to fight back.

The cockpit was markedly lower hanging than he'd expected. The _clang_ rang out as his helmet collided with the ceiling, and his eyes flashed closed almost as soon as he'd opened them, stumbling forward from the force of impact. _Okay, that's more painful than I thought._ It throbbed dully in his skull, but of a much more pressing concern was the absolutely ruined atmosphere. So much for the grand frightening teleport.

"What?!" came the shrill gasp; _no._ Lotor looked up, stooped - _I've never been so angry to have inherited some of that Galra legginess_ \- and met the topaz-amethyst eyes of the Altean princess.

"You have got to be drytting me." It came out low, dry. Sometimes, the universe just spread its legs for him - and sometimes, it demanded he do the same.

From behind him came the Blue Paladin's voice; higher pitched than he'd expected, but masculine. He sounded exhausted. "Allura- What the fuck?! How the hell- Allura!"

Lotor didn't turn to look at the Paladin. He was flying the Lion, he wouldn't pose any physical threat right away. It took time, in such a cramped space, in such an awkward position as a pilot's seat, to aim a weapon or get any decent momentum. He kept his gaze on the princess, even as she squared her shoulders (such as she could, even as she stood - she too was half stooped). Lotor flashed his teeth in a grim smile. Altea may not have existed for thousands of decaphoebs, but their martial practices had not been entirely lost. Lotor knew a combat stance when he saw one.

"Impressive. I never imagined that Alfor the Planetbreaker would have taught his _daughter_ how to fight."

Her eyes flashed, going wide and then narrow and then wide again, indignance and confusion and anger swirling together. All of it was ancient history to Lotor, but he'd heard enough chatter from rebel outposts to understand what it would mean to her. And what some of it wouldn't.

She didn't even deign to respond, simply cocked her elbow and threw herself forward. It was a sleek movement, well measured. Lotor could see the force behind the strike; her whole body weight would impact through her elbow. A good, flat hit - it would hurt him, but she'd catch it on the flat, distributed back through her upper arm. Unless she landed on his nose or another equally delicate spot, it wouldn't do real damage to either of them.

The paths inside him were already open. It hurt less, this time, flooding the quintessence through his body. More like losing a layer of skin than being flayed alive. The light-smoke coiled around him, violet laced in green, and condensed inside him. It was disorienting, when he landed again, his view spun around without the sensation of movement, but he swallowed the tingle of nausea and forced a little chuckle instead.

"Without even a proper greeting? My. For a pureblooded Altean, you fight rather like one of _us."_ Because his heritage might be obvious in his face and his ears and his hair, but he knew how the princess operated. She considered him the enemy, just another Galra she had to fight. And why not? He was currently commanding the Empire she'd sworn to defeat.

Rage twisted her expression and made her face ugly as she turned to face him. Behind her, the Paladin was twisting in his seat and getting on his knees, light spiralling from the quintessence lock on his armour and into his hands, his bayard forming.

In a normal fight, Lotor would have taken two-to-one odds quite happily, even against a pureblood Altean and a Voltron Paladin. But this was not a normal fight. Not only was the space cramped and restricted - preventing him from drawing sword - but the Paladin was squinting at him down the sights of an _energy rifle._ Decidedly bad.

The princess lunged at him again, and this time Lotor let her; if she was in the way, then the Paladin wasn't a threat. He wouldn't risk shooting her, not even to get at Lotor.

Instead of teleport away, Lotor built the quintessence under his skin like a malleable shield and threw up one arm as she reached him, letting the elbow strike connect against his own forearm. Even as he shoved back, he aimed just past her ribcage with the other hand, two fingers outstretched, and felt the painful crackle as quintessence liquified into lightning and jumped from his fingertips.

The smoke bled around him, strengthening him, forcing the princess to stumble back from him. The violet lightning struck the Paladin's seat, and he let out a shrill yelp as it connected. Probably not enough to do real harm - not shot out so haphazardly (and Lotor had never met expectations when it came to elemental magic), and not channelled through the Lion itself - but the Paladin at least felt it.

Lotor jumped after the princess, the tightness in his chest a mixture of magic and racing heartbeat. _This is my own fault, really._ Acxa might share his concern, but Ezor and Narti were right. He needed to practice more often.

If only practicing magic didn't run equal risks of failure or success. Not that Lotor had admitted that weakness - not aloud, not even to those who knew.

He drew the dagger clipped to his wrist, a tiny silvery thing that almost looked like glass. Not Galran in origin, of course. It was too delicate for that, too apt the weapon of an assassin. If there was something Galra were not naturally good at, it was subterfuge. Even Lotor hadn't truly understood how bad he'd been at it until he'd met Ezor.

The light-smoke trailed behind him, breathing out from every pore, clinging to individual strands of fur. He was faster and stronger then her, with the magic winding through his body. The princess hadn't been prepared for the counterattack; she'd probably been waiting for him to dodge again. When he grabbed her wrist and tugged her closer, she twisted and kicked out, connecting solidly with his shin. Lotor hissed softly, because there was only so far that magic could dull pain, but a burst of purple light erupted around the point of impact, coiling into nothing, and he stayed steady.

"I don't recommend it, Paladin," Lotor said quietly, half stepping forward while the princess didn't have strong footing. He got a leg between hers, kicked sideways. She tried to right herself, of course, twisting with frankly astonishing flexibility, but she was unbalanced and she couldn't properly counterattack. Lotor pulled the wrist he'd caught, yanking it up behind her as hard as he could. The bipedal body only moves in so many ways.

Her shoulder turned, elbow bending as she tried to accommodate the drag without her joints breaking, lifting her torso sideways as she went. Lotor flipped his grip on the little dagger and held his other arm out. His forearm pressed lightly against her throat - turned backwards, the point of the dagger rested a hair's breadth from the fabric of her spacesuit.

The princess saw the flash as the dagger passed her vision. She went still, both feet firmly on the floor now, but unable to struggle. One way risked a dagger in her throat - the other risked a dislocated shoulder. One would make her dead, and the other made her easy prey.

The Paladin, sapphire blue eyes wide, let his bayard deactivate. He didn't lock it into his suit, but he lowered it, and it stayed dormant.

"Good. Now, shall we talk about this like civilised people?"

Keeping very still, the princess snarled. "We're going to kill you, _Prince._ You've made a huge mistake. Our friends are coming back, and-"

"Ah, yes. Your friends. Blue Paladin, I do rather assume you're still in radio contact with them?" A moment went by, and Lotor's gaze went back to the Lion's chosen. "You know, generally, when I speak I'm not being rhetorical." He pulled up on the princess' wrist, just enough to elicit a snarl. Of course, if he could get through this without making a mess, that was always preferable - but it itched under his skin, the bloodlust, the quintessence roaring through open pathways that spent too long stitched shut.

The Paladin's shoulders tightened. "Y-yeah. Of course." Strained, when he spoke. Some of it weariness, certainly, but the adrenalin was bright in his eyes. The poor boy didn't know what to do.

Some tiny part of Lotor felt guilty. Another, equally tiny, part felt vindicated. "Well then, while we wait for your friends to arrive, why don't you work on flying us over to _my_ friends, hm? The lightcruiser, just over there." Lotor didn't bother indicating a direction. It was clear on the Lion's viewscreens.

For a moment, the Blue Paladin looked to the princess instead, indecision clear in his face, but his eyes settled on the glint of the blade and he turned back in his seat. Almost seamlessly, the Lion began to drift towards Lotor's generals.

They saw it when the second Lion came through the rift. It was behind them, but the light ballooned out and puddled in the cockpit. It was suffused a peaceful blue as the Lion's solar shields went up, and Lotor struggled to focus on the princess and not close his eyes. The afterimages flickered across her once the light faded again, and he felt the dagger point touch as it made his hands unsteady, but he blinked it away as much as he could and tensed up. Not for too long, just to make sure she didn't think it was an opening and force him to hurt her for real. He needed her as unharmed as possible for as long as possible; the more she was wounded, the less effective she became as a hostage.

The crackle came across the radio, loud enough for Lotor to hear in the otherwise silence. _"Princess, that's a Galra ship!"_ An Altean accent - it must be the other pureblood. Lotor wasn't sure what to make of him yet, not really. Not enough information, not enough exposure to him. He was a capable pilot of the Castleship though, so… what was he doing in a Lion? The Castleship wasn't here - it couldn't have passed through the rift intact.

Its absence was… worrying, in its own.

"Guys… Don't do anything, okay? You can't do anything. He's got Allura." Surprisingly even, anger flickering through his voice, but the Blue did nothing more. He just kept flying.

 _"What? Allura! What do you mean 'he's got her', who?!"_

A faint smile, but they couldn't see it so Lotor put it aside. "Go on, princess. I'm sure you've got enough leeway to speak." Almost teasing, just to see the glint of impotent rage in her eyes. It was foolish, but the rush of magic always did this to him.

She locked his gaze, teeth bared. "Forget about me, Coran. Hunk, you need to attack the lightcruiser. Now!" Spat through her teeth, defiant. It spun under Lotor's skin, his fur on end; the smoke clouded around his hands, crackling with sparks. The princess flinched as they touched her, even though they couldn't possibly hurt through her suit - the dagger kissed her throat again.

"I would belay that order if I were you, Altean," Lotor spoke up, raising his voice but careful not to shout. Shouting gave a sense of urgency, desperation that he didn't feel and had no purpose for. "Ensure the third Lion is aware when they come through. Any attempt on my ship or my crew will result in the end of your princess' life, very quickly followed by your Blue Paladin. I might not be able to pilot this Lion, but neither can you."

The princess snarled softly, tugging against the grip on her wrist, testing his boundaries. He fed quintessence into his muscles, tightening his hold, and didn't give a single microspan.

Once again, the Blue Paladin spoke; he sounded more tired now than he had when Lotor had arrived. "It's okay. Just do what Lotor says for now, okay?"

 _"But Lance-"_

"Last warning, Altean," Lotor said over him. "We can discuss this further when we're on more even footing." Which was technically an untrue statement - Lotor was the one with hostages, after all - but even so, he'd feel much better when he was back on his ship instead of locked inside the Blue Lion with his enemies, stooped over.

 _"Even- You quiznakked sw-"_ broken off in an indignant choking sound as Lotor burst into laughter.

"You need not agree, Altean. It's _your_ princess' life we're gambling with, after all. I don't care a gleam for her." As he met her eyes, still full of fury, but she seemed unmoved by that sentiment. That was fair, he supposed.

The radio was silent.

It came across to them, when the light flared up again and the last Lion came through. A question regarding the comet - _Good to know who has it_ \- followed by half a sentence about the rift and then exclaimed curses. Lotor might not understand the exact connotation of their _human_ cursing, but he knew naughty words when he heard them. The Altean was the first to respond, but even he didn't get far.

The Blue Paladin shushed all the voices, glancing back as the princess let out a low sound; Lotor dug the point into her neck, finally breaking the fabric. He didn't do real harm, of course, but the prick was enough to sting. Veins of deep pink seeped into the blade, dark enough to almost be red. The dagger flashed again, greedily absorbing the blood. "Guys! He's hurting her, just lay off! He won, okay? Let's just… find out what he wants."

A sound carried across, something angry and violent. Lotor wasn't sure who, but honestly it didn't matter. He wasn't planning on making friends with the Voltron Paladins - he hardly needed to bother learning their names and personality quirks.

Silence reigned again, as the Blue Lion closed in on Lotor's lightcruiser. As they approached docking distance, Lotor began to wish the Green Lion had been first through. Thank the Throne it hadn't been the Yellow - Lotor was uncertain the lightcruiser was actually big enough to accommodate the thing. It was at the universe's pleasure the Black Lion seemed to be out of commission.

Carefully, Lotor pulled the princess closer, her back against his chest, and shifted his hold on the dagger. The point faced away now, the edge resting hungrily against her neck. He released her wrist, and only now did he reach up to re-engage his own communications.

"Acxa, it's me. Have Narti open the slave bay." An indignant splutter from the Blue Paladin. "Oh relax, boy. There aren't any slaves _in there_ right now. Downright wasteful." Somehow, that didn't seem to reassure him.

Acxa's voice was edged in relief and pride when she responded. Lotor tried to ignore how that made him feel; it wasn't as if he could deny it after so many years, but it never did to acknowledge it. That wasn't how it was supposed to work. _"Yes, Sire. I'll meet you there. Your fighter is safe and sound."_

A smile this time - brief, but sincere. A flash of sharp teeth. "Excellent work, Acxa."

The Blue Lion took up most of the space inside the bay; the Lion itself was stooped as its paws touched the floor and its jetfire disengaged. The lightcruiser shuddered as it took the Lion's weight - even with the light gravity the cruiser was equipped with, the Lion was heavy enough to cause distress. What little cargo that had been stored here was knocked aside, piled up against the walls.

Lotor waited for several doboshes, tense inside the Lion's cockpit, while the bay closed behind them and repressurised. Only once Ezor's voice came through _("Alrighty, you can leave without dying now!")_ did he step back from the Blue Paladin, the edge of the dagger pressing sweetly into the princess' neck and forcing her to step with him. He could hear the faint scraping whine of her armour against his.

"You first, Paladin. Out of the Lion. And please, try something stupid. I beg you; give me the excuse." To ruin the mission, to risk the grand objective, to get Altean blood on his hands. It was foolish, slipping out between the tingle under his skin and the wicked little grin that showed his teeth, but it was all Lotor could do just to hold his hands steady. Quintessence thundered inside him, free from its normal cage. He wasn't bluffing - he wanted the excuse of the Paladin's attack. He ached for it.

The Paladin met his gaze for the briefest tick and then looked away. He looked to the princess, but whatever he saw there did not encourage him. His helmet closed fully over his face - he clearly didn't trust Lotor at all, although Lotor wasn't sure what he thought a dead hostage was worth - and he got out of his seat.

Taller than Lotor had expected, but still smaller than he was. Arguably smaller than the princess, but still enough that his spine was arched as he moved. His bayard was still in hand, but held loosely, low at his side. Not exactly the stance of someone about to attack.

Disappointment bit in Lotor's chest.

But even so, he walked the princess after him. The dagger cut through her spacesuit as the Lion moved, Lotor caught off guard by the sudden shake - it seemed Zarkon hadn't lied to him. They really did move on their own. The Paladin went first, down the Lion's throat and out over its teeth into the bay.

It was… strange, to walk out from the Lion's mouth. Lotor could feel the faint rumble through his feet as he did, quintessence bubbling in his gut in response. It felt… displeased. Almost as if the Lion itself was threatening him.

"Ah, Narti. Good of you to meet us," Lotor spoke up as he drove the princess over the Lion's teeth and to the floor. The blade cut her as she did, their tandem movement out of sync, and she hissed softly. Lotor saw the Blue Paladin clench his hands, even as the front of his helmet opened again. Behind them, the door to the observation deck slid shut and Narti leapt over its railing, landing silently with Kova draped across her shoulders. Yellow eyes surveyed them, even as Narti rose to her feet and began to approach. "Paladin. Surrender your bayard and submit to her. If you will."

Again, Lotor almost wished that he wouldn't. The smoke rose from his shoulders in curling wisps.

For a long moment, the Paladin stared at him. The princess didn't struggle, but she was edged away from the dagger, just slightly off center; the perfect picture of a hostage. Lotor had no doubt she was scheming all the ways with which to fight back, but with a blade that close to cutting her throat, there was little she could do without magic.

And Lotor hadn't yet felt the pulse of her quintessence. It was like she didn't even know how to use it.

The Paladin turned back to Narti, tightened his grip on his bayard for a moment, and then slumped. He tossed the bayard to the side. Narti stepped towards him and got a grip on his elbows, pulling them back until they almost met behind him. He could struggle if he wished, and he might even break her grip, but Kova slid from her shoulders to his and coiled there, watching with unblinking eyes. Narti reached up with her tail and tore off the Paladin's helm, tossing it towards Lotor.

Lotor released the princess, reaching up to catch the helmet with one hand. Even as he did, he let his quintessence bubble up and out of his skin, puddling around him like liquid smoke, and then let it contract inside him again.

This time, it was a pleasant sort of burning as he teleported to Narti's side and out of the princess' inevitable attack. She stumbled, overbalanced as the force of her haphazard attack met nothing.

"Now now, princess. I'd be more than happy to fight you if you wish, but know that Narti is not particularly merciful." Next to him, Kova dug his claws into the Paladin's neck; strangely, despite the panic that lit the princess' eyes, the Paladin himself didn't react, even when the animal's claws drew tiny pinpricks of red.

Red blood? Now that was interesting. He really must look more into the research the Druids had managed to conduct on humans thus far.

A low sound escaped the princess, bordering on hysterical. She looked between Lotor and the Paladin, back and forth, crystal rage glinting in her eyes - but she stayed where she stood, made no move to attack again.

A soft hiss from Kova drew Lotor's attention, but almost as soon as he looked, the Blue Paladin drew it again. He was limp in Narti's grasp - not fighting, his breath harsh. There was an emptiness in his eyes that was unnatural. It struck a chord somewhere deep inside Lotor's gut, something bloody and naked in the aftermath, his magic pathways torn open. Revulsion filled him like bile, and in a blink he was standing close to the Paladin. Helm still in hand, Lotor squared his shoulders and decked him.

The princess shrilled behind him, rage and indignation, but Kova meowed warningly and Lotor didn't turn to face her.

Blood beaded at the Paladin's lips, a dull throb waking in Lotor's knuckles where they'd collided with his teeth, but otherwise there was no reaction. _So very very red._ His quintessence billowed out from the point of impact, but Lotor forced himself to take a step back and tried to hold it in check.

"... I assume your communications are still functioning, Paladin?" A little too strained, a little too obvious that Lotor wasn't in complete control, but he pushed it aside. They didn't know him personally - it shouldn't be so obvious to them. Narti wouldn't have mentioned it in front of them even if she could talk.

The Paladin didn't respond, didn't even acknowledge the question, still staring off into the void, eyes glazed. _There's something wrong with him._ That was… interesting. Over his shoulder, Lotor looked towards the princess, gauging her reaction.

Body tense, hands clenched, teeth ground together and slightly visible. But it was fear in her eyes now, instead of rage. An edge of desperation in the way her weight wove minutely side to side. She understood what was happening to her Paladin; not an unusual reaction, then.

The white and blue helm crackled, and a voice Lotor didn't know came across it. _"You bet your fuzzy butt they are! Give Allura the heck back!"_ The voice sounded angry.

"You want her back?" he questioned, teasingly, studying the Blue Paladin thoughtfully. "I assume you want your Lion back with her?"

 _"Our- You fucking let him take the Blue Lion?!"_ Definitely angry. The smoke curled inside Lotor's chest. _"Nah, fuck that. Not your fault, Hunk. Hey, L'oreál! Give us back our friends or I'm blowing apart your ship."_

The points of Lotor's teeth pricked against his bottom lip as he grinned, the smoke condensing into light as it curled off his skin. "Oh, I like her. Although you might want to hold off on that, Paladin, or my friend here is going to rip out the Blue Paladin's throat. Nothing personal, you understand."

Gently. Almost soothing, as if he were trying to calm a child. The choked sound of rage that came through the radio was mirrored behind him, the princess pacing but not daring to approach any further. Kova lay coiled across the Blue Paladin's shoulders, yellow eyes tracking her every movement, claws tucked against the boy's throat. Lotor could only imagine how frustrating it must be, to be so helpless.

 _Well… I prefer not to remember._

A different voice, this time. Low, jagged. The voice of a wounded soldier. _"What do you want, Lotor?"_

"Shut up, Keith," came the hissed reply, before Lotor could do more than raise an eyebrow. It was antagonistic, the princess pausing in her pacing, but her voice held low. _Now that's interesting._ Friction, there, within Voltron itself.

Lotor grinned; it was feral. "You should listen to your soldiers, princess." Chastising, as if he were teaching her strategy. "Which one are you?"

 _"I… Red."_

A response that gave Lotor pause. He knew what the Red was supposed to represent, what qualities and abilities they brought to Voltron - the hesitance in the Paladin's voice, the decision to negotiate instead of advocate attack - these were not Red qualities. So what had happened?

It seemed that Lotor had chosen an inopportune time to strike.

"Keith," came the princess' voice again, warning. As if she retained any control of this situation.

Lotor approached her, turning the blue helmet in one hand contemplatively. "Quiet, princess." Softly, leaning in just a little closer, as if admonishing a child. "Tell me, Red Paladin - if you are here, where is your Lion?"

Silence met him on all sides. The princess glared daggers at him, shifting her weight, her every movement barely contained violence - but her eyes kept flicking to the Blue Paladin behind him, caught in Narti's grip, Kova's claws so close to breaking skin. She did nothing. From the other Paladins came silence too. Above him, there was a faint tremble in the air, something Lotor could feel rather than hear, a rumble of quintessence. But the Blue Lion was motionless too.

Lotor sighed. "Very well. It hardly matters. Here are my terms, Voltron. Give me the comet you just salvaged from that ship, and I'll return the Blue Lion to you."

Confusion crossed the princess' face, followed moments later by understanding. The anger melted away in favour of an aghast expression. "What? We can't… We can't give you the comet."

 _"What? Why the hell not?! Give him the stupid thing, who cares? We need you guys!"_ The same angry voice as before, a voice Lotor couldn't place. Strange, that it wasn't the Red Paladin - it had the right qualities. Then again, people became strangers to themselves under such stress. Perhaps it was normal.

The princess' hands clenched, and she finally stood still. "You don't understand, Pidge. The comet - it's the same as the one my father forged Voltron from."

 _"If we give it up, there's no telling what Lotor might make with it,"_ came the other Altean, grim. _"But he has Lance and the Princess. I'm sorry, Princess, I agree with Pidge."_

"Smart man." Lotor offered the princess and smile - all fangs. She was outvoted already by her teammates; if he knew anything of them, she would fall in line.

A few moments passed, the princess stricken and dithering, but she eventually bowed her head. "... Very well. Give him the comet."

 _"We have no proof he'll keep his word,"_ the Red Paladin interjected. _"How can we be sure he won't just kill you anyway? You said he already has Lance."_

Something flashed in the princess' eyes, a searing bitterness that Lotor didn't quite understand - but he dearly wished to. If only he had the time - the means.

His gaze lit on the Blue Paladin for a moment.

"Okay, Red Paladin. That's a fair point. I'll send you back the princess and the Blue Lion first. Then you give me the comet." _And assume the rest. Go on._ If he could avoid giving his word for anything more, he'd like to. Lotor didn't like to make promises; they were too binding.

The princess bit her lip, but agreement chimed through from her team. _"And you don't hurt Lance,"_ the Red added. A sliver of anger in his voice, the threat of retribution. _There's that Red._ But it was better than Lotor could have hoped for. Grinning, he offered the princess a short bow - one royal to another.

"You have my word that the Blue Paladin won't be harmed, so long as you hold up your end." A little wave of a hand, and Lotor saw the flash of fur as Kova dropped to the floor, where he sat with his tail curled around his paws. Narti relaxed her grip on the captive Paladin - he didn't make any move to escape. Simply stood, limp, almost leaning against his captor, eyes glassy and unseeing.

The princess tensed, but didn't move.

"Well? Go on, princess. Take your Lion and leave." And Lotor turned away from her, walked back to Narti. He offered her the helm, and once she'd taken it he picked up the Blue Paladin himself. There was no resistance; the human was deadweight in his arms, and a lot lighter than Lotor had expected. Either their armour was an engineering marvel, or the Paladin was underweight. There was no chance a living creature of his height should weigh so little, no matter what the human standard was. "I expect the comet in this bay as soon as you leave."

"Wait!" the princess commanded him. For a moment, Lotor stopped, quivering, quintessence singing under his skin. His fur stood on end, and Narti tilted her head in concern; no doubt his general could feel the shiver of magic in the air. "Where are you taking him?" continued as if she couldn't, oblivious to the hairline Lotor now walked.

He kept his back to her, fought the sudden thundering in his chest for control. "You wouldn't want him exposed to the vacuum, I assume?" Lost. His voice shook, but he tried to play it off as anger. "Be grateful, princess. You and the Blue Lion are free to go, and I haven't even gotten anything yet."

Ineloquent. It didn't quite relay what he wanted it to. Unsteady, all too obvious that he was on the edge. The smoke-light curled off him in spirals, bright purple and deep green, like his quintessence was boiling. It felt like it, inside him.

But the princess didn't know him. "If you hurt him, we will tear this ship apart. Everyone will die. Including you." Snarled, and Lotor believed her.

"Get out of my ship."

Snarled back, while Narti sidled closer, but Lotor gritted his teeth and forced himself to walk away, one foot after the other, up the stairs (Narti slithered ahead and opened the door before he got there, Kova back around her shoulders, holding it for him), out into the hall. Once it sealed behind them, a single howled warning that the bay was depressurising and opening went off, and then Lotor felt the whole ship shudder as the Lion took its own weight.

 _"Sire-?"_ Acxa's voice came through tentatively; they'd been observing the entire exchange, of course. Just in case.

Lotor resisted the urge to tell her to shut up. It was the quintessence, roaring in his system, nothing more. _Control yourself._ Lotor was not an animal. Only animals acted on instinct - Lotor was Galra. Galra acted on reason.

"Get the hyperdrive ready. We're leaving as soon as we've got the comet."

* * *

Normally, it felt like coming back to consciousness. It wasn't quite the same (and Lance had been knocked unconscious plenty of times), but normally Blue held him close in warm waters until he was strong enough to swim again, and he'd make his way back to reality. It was disorienting, and it took time for him to get his senses working properly again, but it was _safe._ Blue kept him safe, Hunk and Pidge kept him safe. It wasn't scary anymore - just… bad. Shameful. It got in the way of everything - made him a burden.

But this was different. There was no peaceful ocean this time, no warm water. It felt like being lost at sea in a storm. Blue's mind crashed against his from every direction, screaming and frozen. Lance could barely breathe. It _hurt._

The message was clear enough. _Wake up._ Desperate, demanding - _wake up._ And Lance tried, he tried to orient himself and then he tried to let the waves push him; maybe Blue was trying to force him back into his own head. He tried to swim.

But it was too cold, the waters too savage. Panicked - terrified. Blue was afraid, she needed him, but he was too weak to help her. Stuck inside his own head, drowning in Blue's thoughts. The familiar self-loathing was like ice inside him, shattering on every surface, but it didn't help. He wanted to give up, to sink under the waves entirely - but he couldn't. Blue was screaming in his mind, pleading. _Wake up._ He couldn't abandon her.

So he kept struggling. He kept failing.

And then, without any warning, with barely a whisper of regret from Blue, the storm went dead. Cool, glassy ocean stretched out around him in every direction. And then… something soft. Fragrant. _Flowers?_

Something different touched his mind. A presence, something that was like Blue but not like Blue; it spoke with a voice, with real words. Not Blue. Not even a Lion.

 _"Lance!"_

The waters closed over his head for a moment, and then the new presence was all around him instead, soft and silky and smelling like-

 _"Allura?"_

 _"I'm sorry, Lance. You have to get back to your body - you have to fight him, okay? Just get out of the ship. We'll save you."_

He didn't understand. The ship? What ship? Where was Blue? Who was he supposed to fight?

They'd save him from what?

And she was there, whispering in his head, connected to him, weaving through Blue's ocean. He didn't know how, but she was - words flashing between them as fast as thought. She heard the questions. He heard her answers, half-formed, panicky - angry. They still didn't make sense.

Who was Lotor?

 _"This way. Back to yourself, okay? Fight him."_

She carried him. The storm was raging around them again, ice and whirlpools and hammering rain. Blue was swelling, thoughts frozen and jagged - her power roaring and spilling out, overflowing.

Lance shrank back from it. He knew what it meant when Blue let her power overflow. Hadn't they done it enough? Wasn't he damaged enough? Who did he have to fight that made it so necessary - why was Blue so scared?

But the ice didn't touch him. Around him, Allura's thoughts grew colder and colder, the flower-touch crystallising and sharpening, their scent fading until everything was Blue's scent, Blue's rage. Lance could feel the strength returning to his mind, lucidity and memory coming together like they were supposed to. _Lotor._ They were on his ship. But they'd been walked out of Blue, Lance had been-

 _No. Wait. "Allura, don't-!"_

The familiar numbness overtook him and Lance jerked as he came to, ears ringing, vision reeling. A faint pressure held him against something rigid, sound vibrated around him, but he couldn't quite pick it out yet. Nausea boiled in his abdomen.

The pressure grew slightly as he struggled, but one frantic sound later and Lance was dropped onto the floor. Blue thundered in his mind, but she seemed… distant, somehow. She couldn't pull away that far on her own - Lance was in control of their distance, no matter how Blue tried - but yet there she was, frozen and angry and so very far away.

The impact on the floor didn't hurt - almost nothing did anymore - but the acid still stung a little as it came up. Desperately, he reached out towards Blue.

Between them, forcing him back, was a wall that didn't feel like his Lion. It hovered in between them like a forcefield, like a particle barrier. For a moment, it didn't make sense; nausea and dizziness spun inside him, and he closed his eyes. He wasn't really seeing much yet anyway.

Voices settled around him into sense. "...n this up. Ezor, get him some water, will you?" A familiar voice, one that struck the chord of fear in his chest. _Lotor._

That's right. He was on Lotor's ship. He was- but Blue wasn't here. She was… somewhere else. It didn't make sense. She'd never leave him behind, and even so, why was-

He touched the barrier between their minds again. It was soft; silky, like rose petals. Like flowers.

 _Allura._

A whisper against his mind, regret and rage. Not overwhelming, not like Blue - it didn't override his own thoughts like Blue did. It was… smaller in scale. More like his own mind than a Lion's.

 _Allura._

How was Allura in his mind? Even with the other Paladins, he'd only ever brushed their minds when they formed Voltron, or when they used the special mind-melding machines to simulate it. He couldn't even fully connect to Blue with Allura in the way, and even if he could they only had three Lions. Voltron wasn't even possible. But then…

Lotor spoke again. "I had no idea the Lions could bond more than one Paladin at a time. Awfully convenient, wouldn't you say?" A low meow responded.

 _More than one._

Even as Lance opened his eyes, everything clicked into place. Staggering, he forced himself to his feet, searching. He was in a control bridge, with four other people. Lotor, standing very close; and his generals. Lance couldn't remember their names, but the one with a cat and no eyes was standing close to Lotor, the cat watching him closely. The blue one was flying the ship. And the orange one with colourful stripes on her limbs was dancing her way back towards Lance, a cup-sized container in hand.

Lance ignored them.

Visible from the ship's viewscreens was the Blue Lion. She was hovering close by, the Yellow and Green Lions much further back. They were motionless.

Blue glowed with a blinding light, glittering, dazzling like a mirror in sunlight. Quintessence and ice spiralled off her in every direction, dissolving and coalescing in equal measure; like an aura. Like she was a cold sun. Ice formed across her body in tight plates, frozen armour - long, jagged spirals came off her paws and teeth, enormous glistening blades.

With concentration, Lance could hear the roar. It was in his head, muted by Allura's walls, but it made his teeth vibrate all the same.

"Is the hyperdrive ready yet?" Lotor asked; something tense in his voice. Anxiety, anger. _Something._ Lance wasn't sure.

"Ten more seconds." The response was just as terse, the blue Galra's fingers flying across her control boards. Suddenly, the rumbling wasn't just in Lance's head. The ship was actually vibrating, ever so slightly.

The hyperdrive.

Panic erupted in Lance's chest, and he took a step closer to the front of the ship, to Blue. _Ten seconds._ It wasn't long enough, but Blue was out there, right there, Allura inside her. They-

He couldn't deny it. He could feel them both, in his head, brushing against his soul. Blue had opened their bond to Allura. Chosen Allura too. _Two Paladins._ And they were right there, ice and quintessence flooding from them. There was no way they could contain it.

Again, again. Coalescence.

Some tiny part of Lance was grateful. At least it wasn't him. It was Blue, and she sufference with them when they went coalescent, and it made Lance's heart ache in his chest, a film of tears filling his eyes. But at least it wasn't him. Twice was too much. He was already broken - lost when he was needed. Numb to all but the most extreme of temperature and pressure touches, his nerves flayed alive by coalescence. Thrice would surely kill him. So at least it wasn't him.

But it was Allura instead.

 _Allura!_ Lance made the call in his mind, another step forward, as the vibration under his feet grew stronger. _Allura, don't! Stop this!_

"Three seconds."

He felt it, the moment Blue's power became too much. Blue kept going, forcing more quintessence into Allura than her body could contain, until it exploded out of both of them, until they self-destructed. Lance felt it, because for a split second Allura's walls bubbled outwards, invading his mind, a gentle, painful pressure. Her voice rang in his head.

 _… hurts…_

Weak. Whispered. Barely a thread of lucid thought.

Then the walls collapsed, and Lance felt it all. Allura was channelling it, Blue's quintessence draining through her bond, but the excess spilled over into Lance. Not enough to cause true coalescence, because Lance could still think, was still aware of what was going on - he could still see the shining, twinkling star of that his Lion had become.

But her power splashed through his bond too, sluicing up under his skin like a tide. Not enough to ruin him - but enough to hurt.

He staggered, dropped to one knee, let out a howl of pain. It was too cold. Gold light shone in his eyes, his whole body shaking; he wasn't sure if it was Blue's quintessence or Lotor's ship. It could have been either - or both.

Blue clung on inside him. Allura was there, a ragdoll presence, consumed by his Lion. Her Lion. _Their Lion._ She was there, but everything was Blue, a waterfall's edge that Lance was desperately trying not to tumble over. Allura was already gone.

"Activating warp."

The roar echoed around him, made his teeth chatter. It was a sound of fury, something so beyond him that Lance cowered. Even from Blue, even though inside her she just desperately wanted to save him, he shrank away from the sound.

Blue was moving. Getting closer, flying for him. Jagged and glinting and humming ice claws raised, ready to tear the ship open to get to him. She was flying for him, she was so close. Lance looked up, looked for her.

 _So close._

A purple shimmer wrapped around the ship, distorting Blue, staining the ice. For a moment, that's all there was. Lance watched as Blue slashed for the ship, her howls ringing in his head, her quintessence everywhere, shivering and crying against the cold and the pain.

The purple shimmer closed, and space fell away as Lotor's ship jumped into hyperspace. Roiling blackness replaced the sight of Blue in coalescence.

Her voice stretched thin for a split second, and then it broke like a rubber band inside Lance's head. The recoil knocked him to the floor, her quintessence slamming against his own like a tsunami. Without a source or any way to spend it, Blue's quintessence expanded, contracted, and then fully liquified. This time, when Lance threw up, it was ice cold water instead of acid.

It stung just as much.

 _Blue._ But she was gone. Already, the touch of her mind had dwindled into nothing; too far away. The rest of her quintessence came up in the form of ice water, whiplash dimming his senses again. Being far away from her always sucked, enduring the silence where he'd become used to lapping waves. Breaking a bond so close to coalescence, so fast it _snapped,_ like a tangible thing in his chest-

The darkness was coming back for him. At least he didn't have to deal with Lotor. Lance was alone now. No waters; no team. Blue couldn't touch him anymore. He was truly alone, trapped on the enemy's ship. A hostage. _A captive._

Suddenly, it seemed only right that Pidge hoped Shiro was dead, instead of this.

Body shaking, the last glimmer of gold light fading from his eyes, unsure he'd ever wake up - or if he even wanted to - Lance passed out.


	6. Pidge, of Leaves

**Hello! I am a garbage person, and I am going to garbage hell, but welcome to my purgatory in the meantime.**

 **Okay, drama over, two notes of clarification: I am not Allura bashing. I adore Allura. She is a person, and she has flaws, same as everyone else in this story. I still adore her. This is been a PSA.**

 **Secondly, I fully and sincerely intended there to not be any shipping in this fic. Not even mention of pre-canon ships. Well, I have failed. There is explicit mention of pre-canon ships. I'm garbage and a slut. It's fine.**

 **Anyway! As always, largely unedited and probably going to stay that way because this hellscape nightmare website's editing system can bite me. Crossposted to AO3 (StarlightLion) if you ever want to see a properly edited version one day lol.**

 **Enjoy!**

* * *

The first time Pidge did it, it killed her.

* * *

They hadn't even picked up the damaged Galra fighter when they realised something was wrong. Allura had woken to the sudden shuddering of the Castleship. For a moment, she'd been lost in panic, reaching blindly for her staffblade - fire roared in her mind, the heat and the screaming red warnings.

It had taken that long - standing at her door, weapon in hand, her hair tumbling askew over her shoulder - before Blue had managed to calm her, rushing into her mind like a cool brook. The cold swept the fire away, eased her breathing, slowed her heart. A quiet bubble of quivering fear, the mice shied away into a corner of her thoughts; as far away from Blue as they could get.

Whispering, from the Lion. Not words, not even thought, not images. Just a gentle wave of reassurance; comfort. Allura felt weak, but she let out her shuddering breath and set the staffblade against the wall.

 _So what is it, Blue?_

An image, this time - ghostly, flickering. The shadow of a lioness, the cloying scent of death. The shadow leapt.

At first, Allura didn't understand. The Castleship shuddered again, and then it was still - Allura opened her door, forgetting she was only in her thin nightgown, and poked her head out into the hall. Empty.

Well, that made sense. Coran was awake while she slept, and the Paladins had their own quarters. Suddenly, not for the first time in the weeks since she'd become one of them, Allura felt guilty for sleeping so far away from the team. Her team. Blue rumbled in her chest, a soothing bubbling spring. Despite herself, Allura smiled slightly.

 _You're right._

Trying to get her hair in some kind of order - blind and with one hand - Allura made her way up towards the bridge. She was closer than the others, but she didn't rush. No alarms were forthcoming, no swelter of flame.

At least Keith hadn't seen fit to set them alight again.

Rage twisted in her gut. It wasn't the time, not now, not when she didn't quite know _what_ had happened, not with Blue singing peace into her thoughts, a constant ocean song, like waves and wind and packed sand underfoot - but it didn't stop her. She never _got_ a good time. There was always something, some new training exercise, or some distress call they had to agonise over and decide if they could risk answering it or not.

Voltron was failing, after all. Voltron had fallen. If Allura was honest with herself, Voltron had fallen long ago. They'd defeated Zarkon, but it had cost them everything. Shiro's loss had set the timer for their self-destruction. Without a Black Paladin, Lotor had overpowered them at every turn.

And he was… They couldn't _predict_ him. At every turn, Lotor was there, out-thinking them, out-flying them, out-gunning them. They couldn't _stop_ him.

Keith had been their detonation. And he'd taken _everything_ down with him. The Castleship - Allura's home, the last fragment of Altea she had left - splintered and melted and without Altean scientists, without Altean ores… utterly beyond repair. Keith had survived his betrayal, but they'd lost the Red Paladin. Even if Red hadn't rejected him - and rightly so - Keith could not have continued as their teammate. They couldn't trust him. Even if it hadn't been malicious - and Allura was dubious - then Keith was out of control and dangerous. Untrustworthy. Even if it hadn't been a deliberate attempt on Lance's life, who knew when Keith would snap again?

And then he'd cost them Lance.

Allura did blame herself for that loss. She blamed herself, and she blamed Lotor, and she blamed Pidge, and Hunk, and Coran. She blamed Shiro, for not being there. She blamed Blue, for not trying harder, for not being fast enough. She blamed… _everything._ But most of all, she blamed Keith.

If Keith hadn't turned on them, if he hadn't torn Voltron apart, they could have saved Lance. If they'd been a united front, a true team - if they'd been able to trust each other… If Keith hadn't forced Red to reject him, they'd have had him at his full Paladial power. They would have had the Red Lion to fight against Lotor. Even where Blue had failed, Red would have been fast enough.

But instead…

Allura's right hand went to her left shoulder, touching lightly at first, before her fingers curled around the aching stump where her left arm had once been.

It still didn't feel real, sometimes. More than once, she'd just outright dropped her staffblade, having intended to catch it with the hand she no longer had. She was still figuring out how to navigate. Hunk and Coran were her biggest helpers - and while Coran fussed, Hunk both helped her out, and laughed when she made a ridiculous fumble.

After the initial instance, when she'd lashed out at him for it, she'd had to admit that it looked pretty funny, watching her just stand and track her staffblade as it clattered to the floor. It wasn't like she could do anything about it once it was on her left side.

But somewhere deep, it stung. Not because Hunk was being malicious - she was pretty sure he was being the opposite, trying to keep the mood light like Lance would have done - but because… this was her life now. She would adjust, and Blue would become close enough in her mind to fly smoothly with only one flightwheel in action, and maybe eventually Coran and Pidge would figure out how to get Altean prosthetic technology working, but in the meantime…

She felt unbalanced. She couldn't even count the number of times she'd accidentally walked into a doorway, or a wall, just because she got one step out of alignment and just went sideways. Every few days, she snuck into the infirmary and debated with herself about taking some of the liquid pain-numbing agent that they kept there. It wouldn't help the sharp, tingling flashes of phantom pain, she knew, nor the sudden and intense need to stretch her fingers or scratch - but it would stop the ache in her shoulder.

If she took enough _(too much)_ it would stop all the other aches as well.

When Allura reached the bridge, she was so consumed in her thoughts that she stumbled into the doorway. For a tick, she glared at it. _Of course._ But she swallowed the thought and walked in all the same, doing a quick visual sweep.

Coran, at his control station. Hunk was nearby, reading something on a holoscreen excitedly; Allura could tell by the slight but steady up-down up-down of his butt as he tried not to jiggle or dance. On the other side of the room, standing on her seat with her hair wild, glasses askew, dressed only in the booty shorts she slept in and an enormous top printed with a strange flower pattern (it was hideous), Pidge tapped away at her own control station, hunched.

She was chattering away - low enough that Allura couldn't understand at this distance, but fast enough and excited enough that Allura could hear her voice like a constant hum - to Keith. The Blade agent stood beside her, leaning in a little, his face lit up. It… almost made him look normal, under the dark purple and too-white scarring that crossed half his face, and the strange asymmetry of only having one eyebrow. Even without his hood, with the thin hair that had grown back on that half of his head a dull ashy blonde-brown rather than black, the way he listened to Pidge blabber with that look made everything seem almost normal.

Just for a tick.

But that was all of them. No Shiro, no Lance. None of the rest of the Blade, whose presence had become so routine Allura expected them. It was just her, and the four of them. They were only missing two people, but somehow… The Bridge seemed so empty, without them. Without Lance's meaningless chatter and bright smile and gleaming eyes, always trying so hard to keep them happy, to the point of irritation - without Shiro's presence, quiet and steady and powerful. Shiro could fill up a room without ever opening his mouth, by only lifting an eyebrow.

"Allura!" came the call. She wasn't sure who said it, but she jolted out of her reverie. At least everyone else (sans Coran) was in their nightclothes as well. It made her feel less weird when Hunk was in fuzzy flannels patterned with abstract reconstructions of the Yellow Lion's face, and Keith was in only a tight pair of shorts.

Pidge was looking at her, amber eyes aglow. "Allura," she repeated, "come here! Come on, hurry up!"

For a tick, Allura hesitated. It was only a tick - Blue purred inside her, vibrating, and Pidge would be between her and Keith, and she wouldn't have to even interact with him - but a tick was enough. So silently that Allura wouldn't have noticed if she hadn't been looking at him, Keith slipped back and away, somehow ending up near the front consoles on the opposite side to Coran and Hunk, leaving Pidge open.

Even Pidge didn't notice, her gaze stuck on Allura.

"Come _on!"_ she urged, gesturing. Pidge was wearing a glove, but just one, on her right hand. Relieved that Keith had moved away - and hating the weird, acidic note of gratitude in her stomach - Allura obeyed the summons.

"What is it, Pidge?" she asked, unable to help the little grin or laugh. Pidge's lonely glove was a tightly knitted orange, with red accents. It stopped right as it met her wrist, and curled over her knuckles without venturing around any of her fingers. Allura had never seen a glove like it.

The Green Paladin didn't even seem to care, bouncing in place and pointing at her screens. "That shaking! It woke you up too, right? God, I nearly had a heart attack, I thought we were under attack or something." Well, that wasn't exactly what Allura had thought, throwing a quick look in Keith's direction - perhaps a glare - but it was close enough. "But it wasn't! It was _Black!"_

That didn't mean anything to Allura at first. Not for a good few ticks, while she blinked and took that information on board. Black? Black was dead. She hadn't moved in phoebs, ever since they'd lost Shiro. She'd stayed sprawled out on the floor of the central hangar, limbs at unnatural angles, head turned, eyes dark. Hadn't moved, or gotten to her paws, or even activated her particle barrier. For all intents and purposes, the Black Lion was dead.

 _It had been Black._

The image flickered in her mind again, the shadow of a lion, death sticky in the air, and all of a sudden Allura _got_ it. Blue purred against her thoughts, nudging gently.

"Where?!" Allura asked frantically, leaning in to look at Pidge's screen's. If it was Black - if she was moving, if she'd shaken them so badly… "Where is she going?"

Pidge pointed. "This is a couple of degrees of orbit out from us. Close to that gas giant we've been avoiding. If she keeps up her current course," and of _course,_ that was the flight path projected up in front of Coran and Hunk, the dark violet facsimile that represented Black flashing as it flew, "then Black will end up riiiiiiight here." Pidge zoomed in a little, and a tiny flickering red dot appeared. "And right there is a Galra fighter. It's so tiny, we probably wouldn't have even noticed it ourselves, unless it had crashed on our doorstep. It's just one fighter."

It was just one fighter. Just one person. And Black was _gone,_ heading straight for it at top speed - _alive._

"We have to go after her. Hunk, Pidge, in your Lions. Let's go!"

The voice that called after her was still Pidge, but the excitement had been replaced with a desperate whine. "What- _Now?_ Can we at least get changed first?!"

…

The Black Lion had torn the fighter apart by the time they got there. This time, Coran had acquiesced to remain behind; Allura had wanted him to come (he'd missed Shiro just like they all had), but he had gently insisted. Someone needed to watch the Castleship. Allura rather suspected it was something else entirely. She wasn't entirely sure what.

Fragments of debris littered the space around Black, the smaller ones spinning a slow, lazy orbit of her body. Her eyes glowed, and she was curled in on herself; inside her, flickering on Blue's holoscreens, was Shiro's life sign.

" _Back to the planet. We need to make sure he's not hurt."_ Keith, and the rage burned in Allura's chest, the immediate desire to snap at him, to say something contrary just because it was _Keith_ who'd said it - but he was right. So Hunk turned Yellow and drifted behind Black, nudging her gently. The Lion didn't respond, so Yellow braced and then set his nose to Black's back, and together he and Hunk slowly pushed Black and Shiro all the way back to the Castleship.

Allura hung at the back of the procession, to keep from hitting any of her friends. Blue shuddered as they flew, little back-and-forth zigzags across the void, moving in short leaps. Only the Lion's cool presence in Allura's mind kept her from tearing up in frustration. _It's okay. It'll pass. We'll learn._ A mantra, passed between them; not in so many words, but a tight, gleaming feeling. Light - hope. Faith.

Blue curled tight around her, licking the doubt off each thought. It was hard now, their movements slow and uncoordinated with one flightwheel and a fresh connection, but Blue kept her from despair. It would get easier. Always, always, Allura was met with the sweet reassurances, the steady gentle _drip drip,_ like a mountain brooklet.

 _It would get easier._

It had gotten easier already. Allura couldn't help but dwell on it, as she followed behind. Pidge flew ahead, plotting their course, zipping back and forth while Hunk pushed Black back towards home. At this point, Keith might as well have been a secondary Green Paladin. It was rarer for him not to fly with Pidge.

Allura wasn't sure how she felt about that.

In the end it was Pidge's decision, who was allowed to fly in her Lion, but Allura couldn't help but be bitter about it sometimes. When it was particularly hard to sleep, when her training got particularly hard. Right now, when it was trying to match her piloting to Blue's, when they weren't quite synchronised. It was his fault. Everything was Keith's fault. _(Not fair, cruel - his fault)._

Blue purred softly, trying to dissuade her thoughts. Allura pushed that away. Why shouldn't she be bitter? It was only out of desperation that they'd gone coalescent together in the first place. If they'd been able to count on Red, if they'd been able to simply back Keith up - if he'd made it to Lotor's ship in time, if - if - if…

The same spiral as always. She couldn't help it. Her shoulder ached in the deep space, even safe inside her Lion. Vividly, she remembered the agony of coalescence. She couldn't really remember the event itself, all blurry blue light and searing cold, but Blue had pulled back quickly, tried to shut it down as soon as their bond to Lance snapped. All that quintessence, rupturing from her body, ripping open her skin. Even as Blue had pulled back, swallowed herself, the wound had torn wider.

Skin and flesh and bone, dissolving under the strain, turning to steam to ash to nothing. Agony. She'd been lucky to survive, and even then only because of Coran. She couldn't even imagine what it must have been like for him, locked away in the dim cockpit of the Blue Lion, carried in the jaws of the Yellow while Allura steadily bled out, leaking quintessence. The entire two hour flight back was just flickers to her, flashes of colour and sound and pain.

Coran hadn't spoken about it. Barely keeping her alive for two hours, one arm dissolved into blood and quintessence up to the shoulder, her mind fractured from bonding to Blue and losing Lance. Allura wasn't sure he ever would. She wasn't sure she blamed him.

 _Keith's fault._

 _Unfair._

 _Doesn't matter._

By the time Allura made it back to the Castleship, Keith and Coran were helping Shiro out of Black. The Lion rumbled at them, eyes glinting, but she did not stop them. Coran was carrying him when they brought him out.

Hunk stayed close to Blue once she landed, and when Allura made her way out, he stayed close to her instead. Allura was grateful. It was easier, with Hunk there to lean on; easier not to dwell on Keith, on their ruined home, their broken team, their failing Coalition. Gently, he held her hand; the only one she had.

Shiro was… skinny. It was the first thing that struck her, when she got a good look at him. He was wearing a thin hide shirt and matching trousers; ragged, barely reaching to his knees, only just curving over his shoulders. His midriff showed between them in a thin strip. His face was hidden against Coran's chest, hiding from the light of the Lion bay; his eyes hadn't healed, then, in all this time. Coalescence hadn't made him blind, but the deep, solid black of his eyes was sensitive to light. In anything brighter than a moonless night, trying to see hurt enough that he may as well be blind.

His hair was long too. It hung down in lank ribbons, shiny oily black, and the white streak was barely visible against Coran's legs, like a pale shadow. His Galra arm was turned towards her; it seemed to fit wrong, without the muscular frame he'd had before. Too bulky, too heavy. Allura could only imagine how many more scars he might have.

He was quivering, but he clung tight to Coran. Allura couldn't be certain, but she wondered if he might be crying. In his position, she probably would have.

Hunk exchanged a look with her, his brown eyes liquid, mirroring her own. Across the room, fluttering back and forth while Coran carried Shiro down and Keith hovered, Pidge couldn't meet anyone's gaze. All the excitement from earlier was gone, replaced with the same shame and anger and howling desperate sadness that Allura had felt from them the first time they'd met.

And he'd been in a Galra fighter.

It broke her heart.

They didn't speak until they'd gotten Shiro to the infirmary, and dimmed the lights down to almost nothing. It made it uncomfortable, for the rest of them. Keith still seemed to be able to navigate fine, but Allura sat herself on a bed and stayed there, Hunk settled by her side. Pidge jumped on the bed Keith dragged closer, while Coran got a little flashlight in hand and started assessing Shiro's injuries. The Black Paladin flinched any time the beam got too close to his face, or shone towards his eyes.

It was Shiro himself who broke the silence. Allura wasn't sure about the others, but she simply couldn't bear to do it herself. Where was she supposed to start? So much had changed; so much was broken. _(Keith's fault. Not entirely. Doesn't matter)._

"... Where's Lance?" Quietly, his voice ragged. Something tight and liquid there; he must be so relieved to be home. Such as it was.

Everyone flinched.

How were they supposed to explain? Where were they even supposed to begin? They'd failed everyone; each other, the universe, themselves - but most of all, they'd failed Shiro. He'd been through hell, twice over, and both times he'd not only escaped but survived. He should have been able to come home to something _else_ \- something that wasn't as quiznakked as the torture he'd just escaped.

Allura couldn't even find her voice. Lance was gone - _Lance was gone._ It was only three words, three tiny little words that sounded hollow, even inside her own mind. Weak. Pathetic. _Lance was gone._ And she'd let it happen. They'd all just let it happen.

"He's… gone." Keith. His voice rough and jagged, probably always would be, scorched. Deserved. "Lotor took him." And shaking, too, sounding like he was barely in control. There was a stinging, wet heat in Allura's eyes. She tried to ignore it. "It's my fault," and he wasn't finished, was going to continue - explain? - but suddenly Allura's voice was right there, and it shook too - a quiet, thundering fury.

"Yes. It _is_ your fault." And she was quite sure that sound was Shiro moving, maybe sitting up, the faintest _whirr_ of tiny gears and the _ting_ of metal against metal, and maybe he was going to ask but it didn't matter, because Allura was going to tell him - because she was going tell him _everything,_ what Keith had _done,_ and Keith deserved how angry and devastated Shiro would be. Against her mind, Blue let go a deep rumble, pressing as if with two paws, but Allura threw her off, ignored the warning. Maybe it was a plea. Maybe it didn't matter.

Her jaw was clenched, fingernails digging into her palm. "It's _completely_ your fault. Lance is gone, because you crippled us. We lost the Castleship, because you _destroyed it_ , and we lost the Red Lion, and you don't _deserve_ her - I'm honestly not sure that you ever did - and we could barely fight Lotor with four Lions, we never stood a chance with only three. Let alone- Let alone _now,_ with- with _me-"_

She couldn't even finish. They didn't even have three Lions; it was more like two and a half. She was half a Paladin. Couldn't fly straight, couldn't fight properly. Her bond to Blue was brand new, it still didn't feel completely smooth, it still caught her off guard. The mice were a constant, terrified ball in one corner of her mind; a pit she couldn't remove or heal.

And the worst part was that Keith didn't even defend himself. He didn't respond, didn't offer any excuse. Not even an explanation. Blue growled quietly in her mind, a deeply unsettled sound. Not quite a whirlpool, but the dark swirling threat of one.

"What are you talking about?" Shiro asked instead, bewildered; exhausted. Too tired for this fight, too hurt. "You lost the Red Lion?"

Of course. Concern. Fear. She could hear movement, was fairly certain Keith had moved away. Avoiding touch? Shiro had always reached for him when things went wrong.

"She won't talk to me," Keith said quietly. Tight. Pained. _Good. (Cruel. Good)._ "It's my own fault, Shiro. I don't deserve her."

"Don't worry, Shiro. Okay?" Pidge, breaking in. Tremulous, as were they all, but Allura could hear the smile in her voice; forced and anxious and… something else. Desperately, Allura wished for the faint quintessence flairs. A foolish wish, sitting in the dark as they were. It didn't stop her from wishing. "We'll tell you everything later. When you're healed."

 _When he can handle it._

Guilt rose alongside the rage in Allura's chest. Pidge was right; Shiro was wounded. He was weak and probably sick. He didn't need to deal with the disaster that was Voltron right now; he needed to rest, and heal. He needed their companionship, their resolve. He didn't need the growing cracks and spitting bitterness.

"We'll put you in a pod." Coran, soft. The flashlight went off, and the lights rose a little. Allura could make everyone out, gathered around Shiro. He winced, ducking his head, but Allura caught the faint gleam of his eyes.

His voice was saturated in horror when he spoke again. "Allura… What happened to you?"

On the verge of tears, she thought. Blue rolled a sympathetic mew into her mind. Her right hand went to her left shoulder, fingers curling around the stump; it was an automatic movement, something she'd done so many times she couldn't stop it. She looked away, and then made herself look back, meet Shiro's gaze. He (unlike some others) deserved her best.

"I went coalescent." His expression broke. "There are always consequences."

She couldn't help it; her voice went hard as she said it. She saw Keith flinch, from the corner of her eye; he knew it was directed at him. Shiro looked between them, didn't understand, couldn't understand. Wasn't sure what had happened to his family.

"We'll explain everything when you're better, Shiro." Pidge, slipping off her bed and padding over, carefully reaching for Shiro's hand. He twisted slightly, met her fingers with his human ones, stopping her from touching his metal arm. It was something he'd always done, favoured his human hand when he touched them, or they touched him. It sparked something in Allura's chest that was both warm and cold; she knew why he did that, always had, and that truth broke her heart, but it was something so distinctly _Shiro_ that seeing him do it again felt like elation.

They were _so lucky_ to be able to see him do that behaviour again.

Coran picked him up. "It won't be a tick, Shiro. We'll all be right here when you come out."

Shiro didn't resist. Allura was certain that he couldn't have, even if he'd wanted to. Instead, he let Coran carry him over and gently slot him into the pod. He offered a quiet, weary " _Thank you,"_ before the pod slid shut on him and filled with suspension fluid. The lights went up some more, so that they could all see easy, but still dimmer than usual. Shiro's hair floated around him in long haloes.

It was even longer than Allura had thought.

"The rest of you, get back to bed." Firm; an order. They all looked to Coran, confused, defiant. One by one, he met their eyes. "You all need to be well rested. We don't know that Shiro wasn't followed. The Galra might show up on our doorstep at any dobosh. Get more sleep while you can."

Sometimes, Allura forgot that Coran had been a soldier, before Zarkon had destroyed their home. It had been harder to forget, these past movements. Harder and harder to forget, since Keith had destroyed their second home.

Hunk obeyed first, casting one last worried glance over them all, eyes lingering on Shiro, before he made his way out. Allura didn't know if he went to bed, or down to Yellow, but she didn't intend to ask. Let him go where he may. She could hardly blame him if he wanted to be close to his Lion. Keith went second, finally giving way under Allura's gaze, taking his hand from the glass of Shiro's pod - casting a look to Pidge that Allura couldn't decipher - and then slinking out without a word. Allura didn't care where he went.

When Allura finally left, Pidge fell into line beside her. The Green Paladin was quiet, keeping pace with her, all the former excitement melted away. There was something almost… cold, about the careful and precise distance she kept between them.

It wasn't until after Allura had turned down the hall to her own quarters, where Pidge should have broken off to head towards hers (and didn't), that she spoke. She kept pace with Allura still, glanced up with this troubled look Allura didn't fully understand. That same almost-coldness was in her voice.

"You know, Princess… Lance used to talk about Blue all the time." _What?_ Whatever Allura had been expecting, that wasn't it. The words struck her in the chest, like bruises under her ribs. "I mean- _all_ the time. Constantly. It was maddening. But he loves that Lion, you know? I mean- way more than is healthy. _Loves_ Blue."

"I know," Allura replied, at a loss. What else could she say? "Blue loves him too." Softly, reassuring. Maybe Pidge just needed company; Allura certainly wouldn't say no to some herself.

But now Pidge finally stopped, and the look she levelled at Allura was almost a glare. It shone, sharp, in her amber eyes. "I know that." Whiplash quick. "This isn't about Lance." And Pidge took a deep breath, squared her shoulders. "You're still having trouble with Blue, right? It shows in your flying. It took me and Hunk longer, but Lance and Keith and Shiro… they could fly their Lions one-handed within days."

Allura flinched. She couldn't help it; if Pidge was trying to pick a fight, that was a low blow. But even as Allura took a breath to defend herself, Pidge kept going - wasn't interested. Maybe that hadn't been the point.

"I know about Blue. I know why she chose Lance, what Team Blue brings to Voltron. We _all_ know, all of us. We've been Voltron together, we've been in each other's minds. It's deeper than that, Allura, we've been in each other's hearts." And her voice seemed a bit tighter now. Anxiety? Fear, pain, anger? Embarrassment? Allura wasn't sure. "The point is, I know why Blue chose you too. Alright? You're _better_ than this."

A blink. Better? Than what? Allura didn't understand, couldn't understand. Pidge was talking like she expected Allura to _know_ but she didn't have a clue what Pidge meant. "What are you talking about, Pidge?" Trying not to sound indignant, because she could hardly blame Pidge if she was a little bit scattered right now. It wasn't an accusation. Pidge was saying that she believed better of Allura; that wasn't an insult.

Was it?

Pidge let out a frustrated sound. " _Blue._ You're an amazing pilot, Allura, and you've been connected to the Lions literally forever. There's no reason you should have so much trouble." As if Allura should know. Should she? After a moment, Pidge folded her arms. "Blue is about _kindness,_ Allura. She's kind and she forgives. She just wants to make the universe a better place. Right? She wants you to be _happy._ Safe." Allura nodded along, because yes, of course - she felt that every quintant, Blue lapping at her mind like a gentle tide, reassuring, comforting, soothing. But Pidge wasn't done, and Allura didn't try to interrupt her.

Unfolding her arms, Pidge took a measured step closer, into Allura's space, one finger held imperiously close to her nose. "What you did today was cruel."

"What?"

"Keith." Snapped, like she'd been expecting the protest. "Shiro. What you did was _cruel._ You have every right to be angry with Keith, Allura - hell, all of us do. He fucked up. He fucked up _bad,_ and he knows it. But Shiro… You know what they mean to each other." And Allura didn't understand the strange flicker in her gaze, the fraction of a tick when she looked away, the faint shimmer of guilt therein. Guilt was something Allura was getting good at reading. "He had the right to explain himself, Allura. To be the one to tell Shiro what he did. And Shiro didn't deserve that. We need to _be there_ for him, and you _used_ him to hurt Keith.

"What you did was cruel, and _spiteful,_ and below a Blue Paladin."

 _Below a Blue Paladin. Below a Blue._ The Lion nosed her mind, cool and warm at the same time, wet and comforting. A reassuring purr - a meow of confirmation. _Below Blue._

Right before her, Pidge blurred.

A hand touched her wrist. Gentle; comforting. _Kind._ "That's what the Blue Paladin brings to Voltron, Allura. You knew it already, even before me. Kindness and trust and forgiveness. Internal stability. There's no point in the Yellow protecting us if we tear ourselves apart. You're a good person, Allura. You care about people, just cause. That's why Blue chose you."

Pidge let go of her wrist, and for a tick Allura felt panic - a sharp, rising need for Pidge to stay, to not leave her alone with the quiet, gentle lack of judgement that was the Blue Lion. Pidge didn't leave. Instead, she stepped even closer and hugged Allura tight around the waist. "It might not be fair, 'llura, but the Lions… They are what they are. They're not anything else - they can't be. You can be angry _and_ kind. I've seen you. You'll never properly bond with Blue until you start being kind again."

* * *

"Absolutely not."

Internally, Pidge seethed, but she swallowed down the indignation. Shiro might have taken back his command as easily as a duck to water, but he was still weak. They still took clandestine turns keeping watch outside his quarters, ready to jump in and stop Shiro hurting himself when he managed to sleep long enough for the nightmares to start. He still pretended that he didn't know they did that, or that it helped him feel secure.

He still barely ate anything, and what he did he still more often than not couldn't keep down. He was still too weak and skinny to even use his Galra prosthetic easily. Hunk had sat down with him and cut his hair, after he'd recovered from the healing pod, while Pidge had chatted away, trying to cheer him up and distract him from the fact that Keith wasn't acting right _(had tried to postpone when she would have to tell him the truth),_ but Shiro's hair still didn't look like it had before. There was less… life to it now. It didn't… _floof_ like it used to.

So Pidge swallowed back the bitter retort, tried to force away the desperate anger that rose in her chest. It rose back up in the form of tears, something she couldn't quite control. The liquid clung to the bottom of Matt's glasses, and the lenses fogged slightly from their heat.

She took them off, swiped at her eyes angrily. Matt's glasses…

"Please." Instead of the rage, instead of fighting. It took every bit of self-control she had, to force back the biting outrage, and when she had all that remained was a plea. Shiro's face quirked down, his brow knotting; his eyes were closed in the half-light, but they crinkled around the edges all the same. "Shiro, it's my _brother._ Please."

The silence dragged out. Shiro's breathing was a little inconsistent, slightly out of time, slightly ragged, but Pidge tried not to worry too much about that. It was always like that, these days. The PTSD Shiro had never admitted to must be overpowering after being in Galra clutches a second time.

Pidge's insides clenched.

"... I can't let you go out there alone, not that far. We can't afford to lose you too." Quietly, his voice shaking slightly. Pidge picked out the threads of fear, even as Shiro tried to hide them behind authority.

Heart sinking, Pidge prepared herself. She'd never said it aloud before, not to anyone, not even to herself. She hadn't ever been told, by Shiro or by her brother; she was sure they'd never meant her to know. At least not for a long time. And given everything that had happened, how long it had been, how different Shiro was - how different Matt was going to be, after everything that must or might have happened to him - she wasn't even sure what still applied. She didn't know how they felt anymore.

In the darkest pit of her heart, in her worst moments, in the pitch black loneliness of nighttime moments spent crying in fear, she wasn't even sure Matt was alive.

But still, she prepared herself to say it. It was low of her. It was _wrong,_ to use it as a weapon - especially against Shiro, especially against her leader, against one of her family. Especially against _him._ But he was saying no, and she had to. _I have to._ She needed to go find her brother.

"Shiro, it's _Matt._ You loved him before. You have to let me go. He would have done it for you."

And Pidge deserved the silence that followed. She deserved the astonished, horrified stare that Shiro pinned her with, she deserved to watch him cringe and cover his eyes a second later because the light (barely enough for her to see clearly) was too painful for him. She deserved the way his breathing hitched and stopped and then whooshed out of him all at once, the way the shudder made him look even thinner and smaller than he was, the way his shoulders shook.

Shiro deserved better than the tiny shudders that followed, and kept following. The way his voice tightened into pain. "You know."

Licking her lips, anxiety knotted in her chest, Pidge got up, swiped down on the wall console to dim the lights some more, and then came to sit by Shiro on his bed. She put a hand on his knee. "I always knew, Shiro. I'm not b- stupid." _Shit. That's not really better._ "I mean- I'm not oblivious. And you really aren't as good an actor as you think you are." A pause, gently squeezing Shiro's knee, a pained chuckle rolling into her voice. "And Matt's never been subtle."

A sharp sound, ragged, drawn from Shiro's throat as if by force. A piercing thought, like broken glass, in the back of Pidge's mind: _I wonder how many times that's happened to him?_ The tears renewed in Pidge's eyes. Good thing she couldn't see anyway.

"... I'm not the same person, Pidge." So quiet she almost didn't hear it, and then suddenly Shiro was hugging her, burying his face in her shoulder, hunched down to her height. He was too weak to hurt her, but it was tight all the same, as fierce as he could manage. The facade dropped. Shiro forsook trying to be her leader, to be their pillar - to be their Black. She hugged him back. "Everything is different now."

 _Oh._

All at once, Pidge understood. Maybe it was Green, purring a soft refrain in the depths of her mind, comforting her, pushing her forward. Maybe the Lions were being devious, because the good Lord knew that they pushed their Paladins together all the time. If it was- _Thanks, Green._

"I know. But that doesn't matter, Shiro. Even- If it is different, between you, it's okay. It… happens." She guessed. God, she wished she was Lance right at this moment. Or at least that she had access to his brain. Lance was so much better at this than she was. "I mean- I don't mean it doesn't matter, that's- Obviously it matters, you matter. I just meant that it doesn't change anything. I mean-" _Ah fuck._

Another quiet sound, jagged, but Pidge's heart lifted. _Laughter._ Even for a brief moment.

"It's okay, Pidge." Shiro drew in breath, sat up a little straighter, leaned back against the wall again. He drew Pidge with him as he did, kept an arm around her. She went willingly. Warm, cuddled up against Shiro, safe with one of her big brothers.

 _I'm lucky to have so many._ Green was warm sunshine against her thoughts.

He rested his head atop hers. "Thanks." _For trying._ Given how bad she was with words, Pidge would take it. "I know you're right. You finally have a lead, we can't just ignore it. But you can't go out there alone, Pidge."

Shiro must have felt the tension that rose in Pidge's body, the quivering that reared up and threatened to devour her. He squeezed - a barely-there pressure against her side - and shook his head. She heard the faint rustle of his hair. "I'm serious. We can't afford to-" and his voice caught, broke. A quick, sharp inhale - trying to cover it, fighting to stay steady. Failing. "We can't afford to lose you too."

Terrified.

 _I know._ She tried to say it, tried to talk around the lump in her throat. _I know. We only just got_ _ **you**_ _back._ But she still had to go. Still would, with or without Shiro's blessing. Even with the screaming doubt and self-loathing clawing inside her ribcage already. And Shiro wouldn't let go, was still holding on tighter than usual, than he really should - expending strength he didn't have. He knew.

Green nudged her.

"I'll take Keith."

And it was a good idea. Taking Keith away on what might end up being an extended mission was a good idea. He and Allura needed some breathing room away from each other; even if they avoided each other as much as possible. _Or Keith runs away every time Allura glares at him._ And Keith was still an exceptional fighter, even without his bayard or Red's quintessence.

That last one was an entirely self-imposed restriction, even if one made out of respect. He'd given her more details over the weeks, as she'd become the only person he really talked to. And god, he was desperate for the conversation. For human interaction. Hunk never chased him off, but Keith struggled with sign language - and Pidge had tried teaching him American Sign Language instead of Altean, but he still struggled with it - and communication between them was sparse. Hunk might not be combative with Keith, but he didn't make the effort Pidge did either.

All the same, Shiro flinched. Pidge made a small, apologetic sound. Thus far, Shiro was still the only other person who knew about Keith's memory loss. She'd had to tell him, mere days after he'd come out of the infirmary. He'd been able to tell something was wrong, from just their brief interaction _before_ Shiro had gone into the pod. He knew Keith too well.

And she had the go-ahead to tell the others. Keith had agreed almost effortlessly, if with a significant dose of anxiety. It was just…

If she told Hunk, then Hunk would feel guilty. Intentions aside, honesty aside, he deserved the time to forgive Keith at his own pace. Telling him Keith couldn't remember anything before they were family would only make him pretend he was ready, because when it came to the people he loved, Hunk was too compassionate for his own good.

If she told Coran, then the Altean would feel honour-bound to try and find a way to _fix_ it, or at least explore all the avenues of damage. Pidge wasn't even sure that 'fixing' it was a good option, let along a viable one. Not everything 'wrong' needed to be _fixed._ And in any case… Keith had refused the idea outright, when she'd brought it up. He was terrified of remembering anything before; of who he thought he must have been. She couldn't blame him. After what had happened… she'd be afraid of knowing too, in his shoes. She and Shiro had tried to reassure him that he'd been a good person, but she knew he wasn't convinced. And all of that aside, Coran could do without the burden. There was something… darker about him, these days. Since losing Lance, since saving Allura. Since Keith had gone coalescent. Pidge had known vaguely that he was nearly six centuries her senior, that he'd been a soldier once - but it was more pronounced now. More obvious in his face. It held the same kind of lines that Shiro's did.

She couldn't have told Lance if she'd wanted to.

And she wasn't sure Allura would let herself care, or if it would become ammunition in her grief-stricken rage.

So it was just her and Shiro. Pidge felt sorry for him. For as much as she cared about Keith, she hadn't known him before Voltron. She'd only barely known _of_ him in the Garrison, and only because Lance had an obsessive personality. It was infinitely harder for Shiro; to have been forgotten.

She licked her lips again.

"I'll take Keith with me. He's a good fighter. He'll watch my back." And whatever else clusterfuck their lives had become, she trusted him to do that. Honestly, he was even less likely to let anything happen to her now than he had been before, and he'd always had a reckless tendency to sacrifice himself.

Guilt was a powerful motivator.

Again, the silence stretched. It felt like a tangible thing, suffocating her, itchy on her skin, but she held her tongue. Eventually, she was rewarded with a quick intake of breath and a tight voice. "Okay."

The tension bubble in her chest burst. There was a smaller, tighter bubble inside it - _Anxiety Russian dolls!_ \- but it still offered some relief, and Pidge breathed out, a tiny smile breaking through to her face. "Thank you, Shiro." Hugging him, tighter, holding back, trying not to hurt him.

She still didn't know where he was, not really. Didn't know if Matt would be okay, didn't know what he'd been doing, if the Galra still had him - didn't even know if he was… alive. But she was going. She had to find him. _I have to. I will._

"Pidge." Pained, his voice like a rubber band stretched too far. "Bring him home."

…

Distantly, she knew Keith was behind her, running down Green's tongue as soon as they landed. It was a vague knowledge, just her senses cataloguing sound and movement. Pidge couldn't have cared less if it was Keith chasing her, or Zarkon himself.

They towered above her, twin black monoliths, monstrous as she sprinted into their shadow. Carved into them were hundreds of statues, countless effigies of countless races. She didn't recognise half of them - she barely recognised a quarter of them. The skill of it was obvious, each half carved into a single piece, everything rendered seamlessly, bodies melting into each other, races all sculpted in unison. Somewhere in the depths, she picked out a human.

She got close enough, and translations started to flash across her visor, brilliant and distracting. The same phrase, engraved below the rising figures, a triumph of unity amongst races, of collaboration and peace, repeated in a thousand languages. Somewhere in the mass, scrawled across the bottom, she picked out English.

It rattled in her mind, hollow at first. Meaningless. Incomprehensible. She didn't understand. Her whole body felt empty, the stormy light of this abandoned rock too bright in her eyes, the weight of her Paladin armour too heavy. She shivered with cold, but the fabric was smothering on her skin, scorching. Sweat clung to her bodysuit, tacky and cloying. She could feel her heartbeat in her chest, a racing pressure, but somehow it felt numb. She felt like she was holding her breath, even as the harsh shudder of her own hyperventilation made her deaf.

It wasn't a triumph. It wasn't a symbol of alliance. It was a _memorial._

 _[In honour of the one hundred, twenty seven thousand, ninety eight brave warriors that stood against tyranny: "The quest for freedom is won through sacrifice."]_

There was thunder inside her, in her ears and her chest. The shock of it made her legs tremble, set her breath alight inside her lungs. It crackled under her skin, lifting it from her flesh; distant, surreal pain that did not sing but rather hummed quietly in her bones. Like smug and vicious loss. Like the quiet malice of death.

"No." Thunder in her ears, ringing out behind her, inside her, everywhere around her, but she forsook it. "Please, no!" Barely even aware she'd said it aloud, as she tilted forward and broke into a sprint, the impacts shuddering numbly up her legs into her ribcage, careening down the slight slope between the immense memorials. Every racing step beyond, down the hill, through the-

 _Graveyard_

-was a battle not to slip and fall, not to skid and roll. Her sight had narrowed, but she kept glancing at the tracker in her hand all the same. Closer, closer.

" _Oh, no."_

Closer.

 _Closer._

Thunder, inside her. Emerald lightning, crackling and clawing. Flickering in her vision, her thoughts. Fighting. There was something- something _distant_ and _desperate_ and _howling,_ but she couldn't focus on it, couldn't separate it from the storm erupting in her chest. It hurt, a sharp pain in her heart, like palpitations, like the muscle was pierced, torn.

Pidge fell. She barely noticed it, scrambled up again, kept running. The moment flickered in her mind and was lost. Kept running. The thunder was _everywhere,_ splitting her skin, dissolving her from the inside out. She couldn't breathe.

 _No, no. No._

The tracker turned red. The marker disappeared. She was right on top of him.

And he should have been there. She could remember him, the light in his eyes, the kindness in his face. The joy when he teased her or made her smile, the delight whenever he was with Shiro, the love when he'd reminded her that he loved her, that she was worth it. The warmth of him. The steady presence.

She could see him, so vividly. Hear his voice, feel his arms around her. She was right on top of him. He was supposed to be here.

The hollowness in her cracked when her knees hit the ground, the _thud_ echoing upwards in devastating ripples, like an earthquake, like a tsunami. They passed through her chest, and she felt them tear her lungs to shreds and rip her heart open. They passed up through her throat, and she felt them collapse it, until it tasted like blood and ash. They reached her skull, broke into her mind, and she felt the whole universe shatter around her like glass.

There was a distant _crack._ Like Yggdrasil itself had sundered. Like every tree in the world had been split by spitting viridian lightning and died a simultaneous, screaming death.

The crack passed back through her, skull to throat to chest. The inside of her stomach felt like liquid. Everything felt like liquid. The whole world turned, like she was drowning, like her very existence was nothing more than a whirlpool of hollow pain.

It wasn't Matt. It was a short, square pillar, inlaid with a digital epitaph, identical to the hundreds of thousands of gravestones surrounding her in an endless forest of death.

Her visor read the digital imprint. When, after a moment, it didn't detect the movement of her eyes that indicated she'd read it, the pixelated voice rang in her ears.

" _Matthew Holt. Zero, zero, one, zero-"_

It couldn't be real.

" _-zero, five-"_

And they broke through, the blinding, stinging tears, hot agony that streamed down her cheeks. It felt like her spine broke, as she dropped forward onto her hands, unable to hold her own weight upright, the sobs quaking across her shoulders and down her back. The liquid in her gut turned to ice turned to lava.

" _-two, five, zero, zero, one-"_

This was her fault.

It sang above the eruption in her chest, the guilt and grief and pain. It hovered above, smoke and ash, dark and choking and undeniable.

This was her fault.

"I-I'm so sorry," torn out in jagged syllables, barely aware she was saying it but needing to say it, needing to tell him. "I was too late." _I was too late._ Her fault. She'd spent too long with Voltron. She'd forsaken her own brother for some unknowable, endless war that was barely even her own.

" _-four, zero, four-"_

She was lost to it.

And the lightning came ever closer, thundering around her, as if the whole world was shaking; _trembling_ at the loss of Matt Holt. _Good._ The universe deserved to crumble if Matt wasn't in it.

She was quivering, even as she collapsed to the ground, even as it spilled out of her in broken screaming. The thunder rolled inside her mind, blistering lightning - and she clung to it.

" _-two, eight."_

She clung to it.

It barely even hurt. She held fast, feeling the thunder shake her apart atom by atom, drinking the lightning. Agony, but it was nothing, felt like _nothing_ compared to Matt-

Matt being dead.

The storm was better. Pidge clung, consumed the lightning until it became too much, until the lightning consumed her. And then, blissfully, there was nothing else.

" _Wait."_

* * *

"No. Please, no!"

He was pretty sure that Pidge couldn't even hear him after that, as she took off at a dead sprint through the obsidian black monuments. It wasn't until he caught sight of the translation scrolling across the bottom of his visor that he realised.

Coldness filled him.

On a normal day, Keith had always been faster than Pidge. On a good day, he still was. Today, even though he gave chase as fast as he could, even when she tripped and skidded and scrambled up, she oustripped him. Panic fluttered in his chest. Behind him, he heard the guttural _whirr_ of the Green Lion getting to her feet, and he stumbled as the roar rippled out across the whole-

Graveyard. It was a graveyard.

 _Oh, Pidge. No._

He reached her just as she collapsed in front of one of the countless shrines, curled into herself, almost flat on the ground. Her screams took his breath away, like frost in his lungs, but he dropped down beside her and dragged her against him, hugging her. She didn't react, didn't acknowledge him. He wasn't even sure she knew he was there.

The wailing sobs didn't slow, her body shuddering against his chest, and he tried to ignore the way the world blurred, and the sticky fog that rose up inside his mask. The Blade masks hadn't been designed with tears in mind. If the atmosphere on this rock had been breathable _(existent)_ then he would have dissolved it.

Everything shook. For a second, Keith didn't register it as anything different, and then the tremor went through him against and he realised that it wasn't just Pidge.

Heat started to touch his skin through his Bladesuit. Slowly, unbearably slowly, the agony of watching Pidge crumbling into fear, Keith looked down. His Bladesuit was thin, true, but it was made of the toughest nanofibre he knew of. It was designed with deep space in mind. It took the power of a star (or close to it) for heat to penetrate.

Through her visor, shining onto his arm, faint gold light painted the black-and-purple a muddy bronze.

Fear turned to terror. Even as he watched, the gold light grew stronger, and then faint green light joined it, filtering through Pidge's bodysuit where it was exposed between armour plates. His vision flickered. For a moment, it was Shiro, glowing midair, and then it was Pidge again, emerald light shining off her in beams that looked almost solid.

Keith felt the icy cold, soaked to the bone in rain so heavy it _hurt,_ and without though he let go, dropped Pidge, scrambled away from her as fast as he could. He slipped, crashed, kept going on all fours. Everything shone with a green hue, the whole asteroid shuddering again. A roar rang out on all sides: Green's voice, a physical thing that knocked him down. The lightning flashed behind his eyes, the screaming wind of a tornado; Keith flinched, overwhelmed. He curled up where he lay, head tucked down to his chest, hands tight around his own neck. There was no good way to lie. The Bladesuit didn't come with hard protection like the Paladin armour did.

The Blade relied on stealth and subterfuge. You didn't wear armour to protect yourself, you avoided conflict at all costs.

Desperately, Keith wished he'd worn his Paladin armour. He knew he wasn't worthy of it, but he didn't want to die. At least it would have shielded him. One stray hailstone to the head could kill him. In the back could paralyse him. He'd be lucky if the hail only broke bon-

 _No hail. There's no hail and no rain. It's Pidge. It's Pidge, it's Pidge._

He peeked out, looking towards the source of the green light. Even as the inside of his mask dimmed in an imitation of solar shields, to protect his vision, the light blinded him.

 _Oh stars. It's Pidge._

Keith kept his eyes on the ground. He could feel the quintessence as it spilled out from the Green Paladin, felt it drag his hood down, felt it prickle his skin through his Bladesuit. At the edge of his vision, creeping, leaf green vines came. They grew, faster, spreading out across the ground like a blanket. Keith had no doubt that Pidge was their epicentre.

They grew out past his sphere of sight, and then the thorns came after them, popping like an aftershock, curved and wickedly sharp and singing with quintessence. Desperately, Keith yanked out his luxite blade and cut a swath, trying to keep just enough ground clear so that the thorns didn't pierce his suit. If the fabric tore, he would die here.

Crouching, Keith balanced his weight on his feet and gave up trying to clear the thickening brambles. Panic made his vision blur as they started to curl around his ankles, tried to envelop him completely.

"Pidge! _Please,_ Pidge!"

A desperate, terrified cry. Keith couldn't even care. It was hopeless, a waste of breath he didn't have; she wouldn't hear him. He wouldn't have heard Lance.

The dagger dropped to the ground, and the brambles consumed it before it had even finished reverting to its dormant state. Pidge might not be attacking him, but he was too close. This was what he'd put Lance through. This was what he'd done, only now he was on the receiving end. And he didn't have a Lion to trigger coalescence in response. He was defenceless.

 _Maybe this was karma._

Pidge would never hear him. Shiro hadn't.

* * *

Hunk was only in the main Lion Hangar because Yellow was. Ever since Keith's meltdown, when they'd carried Red back here in Yellow's jaws, the two of them had just felt more comfortable in the communal space. Red was there, curled up inside her particle barrier. Until Shiro had somehow - miraculously - made it back to them, Black had been in here. Yellow preferred the company of his pride over the solitude of his own hangar, and Hunk couldn't blame him.

Yellow sensed it coming before Hunk did. Tinkering away on some nothing gadget, laying atop Yellow's head and just soaking himself in their bond. It was peaceful. They didn't even really need words in moments like this. They simply lay together, each silently basking in the presence of the other.

The only warning Hunk got was a flash of tension, sudden and emergent, before Yellow Faithful tipped his nose up sharply. Hunk rolled, scrabbling for purchase, until he fell straight through the hatch atop the Lion's head.

 _Hey- ow! What's wrong, buddy?_

A rumble passed through him, apologetic, but Yellow did not release him. Instead, the Lion dropped to the floor, head flat between his paws, and waited.

The seconds went by, and Hunk didn't understand yet. Warily, ill at ease with Yellow's anxiety brushing against him, he made his way forward and settled into the pilot seat. Taking a breath, trying to relax, he closed his eyes and reached for Yellow's senses. The Lion opened them to him without hesitation.

He saw the swirl of quintessence within the Red Lion first, a strange odd sense that his human eyes didn't possess. It was just for a moment, a split second, and then came the rolling wave of fear and rage, ringed in fire - distinctly Red. It was just an echo against Hunk's thoughts, the link with the Red Lion that Yellow Faithful could only share with him in scraps, but he felt it.

Before them, Red's particle barrier dissolved. In a whirlwind of screeching metal, the Red Lion rose to her feet, spun in place, and took off out into the night. In tandem, Yellow and Hunk turned their head to look out after her, searching, the imprint of terror lingering in the air behind her like a metallic scent.

She was already gone.

* * *

The second wave of quintessence shattered the gravestones. All of them, all at once, and Keith couldn't even hear the thousands of them break in unison, couldn't hear the rain of the pieces falling. He was buffeted back, knocked onto his back into the brambles.

They surrounded him. _This is okay. It's okay. This way… Red can choose a new Paladin._

Keith closed his eyes. It wasn't until he felt the shudder of a third quintessence pulse pass over him, until he realised he wasn't in pain, that he opened them again. The vines had grown around him, enclosed him. Through little gaps, he could see the dark brambles, the swamp black-green of the thorns choking the entire symbolic cemetery, but the vines that encased him were soft leaf green. Swaddling him.

 _Protecting him._

"... Pidge."

Maybe she could hear him. Maybe it was just instinctual. When Hunk had gone coalescent, the other four Lions - their Paladins within them - had been protected. But Shiro hadn't even seemed to realise he was there - and he and Lance had fought directly, if Pidge was to be believed (and he believed her absolutely). Their _Lions_ had fought.

He didn't understand. Why was Pidge protecting him?

Shuddering, the vines constricting around him, but they didn't hurt him. A deep rumble went up, a vibration that Keith could feel in his bones, a shuddering that fell in time with his heartbeat. It was like the heady bass of the music Lance liked. The rumble went on, forever, stretching so long that there came a moment Keith felt certain that nothing else had ever existed, and the whole universe was nothing more than faint leaf green light and the endless vibration.

 _Crack._

Something exploded.

Then, for a moment, there was silence.

Light shone, gentle this time, a sweet jade glow that rose around him in haloes. It became mist, then an ocean. The vines surrounding dissolved into light, the sheet of brambles gone. It shone in the air, eerie and beautiful, a sea of tiny green stars. They shimmered in the canopy, twinkling in the fluttering leaves, and then - ever so slowly - they winked out.

 _Wait- Leaves?_

On the ground, eyes widening in awe, Keith looked around. The gravestones were gone, and for a second Keith wondered if he was even in the same place. This was no longer a dim brown graveyard, a wasteland of death and sacrifice.

In the place of each and every shrine rose a tree, the faintest green light covering the wide leaves like a sheen, the canopy so thick it blocked out the sky. The forest was easily twice Keith's height, the branches of each tree only beginning an arm's length above his head. Wind that didn't blow rustled the leaves, an endless whisper.

Keith got up. In a daze, he approached the nearest tree. Woven into the bark at eye level, seamless, was a digital inlay. His mask read it; a meaningless name and number sequence flashed across his display.

All the trees were the same.

 _Pidge._

When he found her, she was collapsed in front of one of the tree-shrines. Her head was turned just a little too far, her limbs splayed out at unnatural angles. The sight of it made Keith's skin itch, panic flaring up in his chest again. He sprinted, skidded, dropped down beside her.

"Pidge. No- no, Pidge. _Please._ Come on, Pidge." Carefully, trying not to rush, trying not to hurt her or drop her with shaking hands, Keith took her shoulders and drew her into his lap. Her visor was dark. Carefully, he pressed a hand against her stomach, trying to feel through the tremors wracking him, praying for movement he knew wasn't his own. After a few moments, he pressed harder. "Pidge. P- _please,_ Pidge. I w-was supposed to protect you."

It wasn't real. It wasn't. It couldn't be real. He couldn't have failed so fucking _spectacularly_ after everything.

Not her.

" _Pidge."_

It tasted like blood, like the sick metallic ash of death. It tasted like how he'd felt when he'd first awoken in the infirmary, alone but for Pidge, still wounded, in agony as the burns finished healing on their own. It tasted like how he felt when he caught sight of his reflection, the twisted scars that ran down half of his face, the miscoloured hair to match.

The tears, searing against his scars, felt like the feeblest attempt at justice, but it was all he could muster.

"No, no… Pidge." But he wasn't imagining it. Her stomach was still under his hand, her body absolutely unmoving. Winking across his visor display, the coldest form of vengeance he knew, was the lack of heartbeat within the Green Paladin armour. "No… P-please… _Please._ Pidge."

It wasn't even coherent. He knew it wasn't. His own voice scraped against his ears, low and rough and _wrong,_ like it had been since he awoke, gravel in all the wrong places. The fog rose up inside his mask again, the display blurring. The salt in his mouth almost overpowered the acrid taste of failure.

In the distance, laying on the crumbling ruins of the carved memorials, the Green Lion's body lay equally as still, tailtip touching the ground, legs twisted. She was half on her back, splayed as if she'd fallen, the obsidian rubble scattered around her. Her face was turned towards them.

Keith felt her eyes on him, devoid of their gold light, just as dead as their Paladin. He felt Green's empty gaze in him, judging him, condemning him.

It felt like deserved damnation.

He gloried in it.

Aeons went past. Entire lifetimes blinked away, Keith just sat underneath the forest of death, held Pidge's body close. He couldn't move. What was he supposed to do? He couldn't go back. _I have to take her home._ He couldn't face them, any of them. He didn't think Allura had it in her to kill him, not even for this - but he would deserve it. He couldn't go back.

 _I have to take her home. She deserves that. The others deserve that._

But he couldn't stay. How could he? How _dare_ he? This was his fault. Lance was gone, and that was his fault - and now Pidge was-

 _Please, Pidge, please… You can't be dead._

His muscles felt like stone by the time he moved. The green light was still shining in the leaves, twinkling away. It felt timeless, as if Keith could spend an eternity between heartbeats.

 _Pidge didn't have any heartbeats._

Something inside him broke open. It spilled out in waves, howling sobs that shook the air around him. The leaves rustled quietly, whispering accusation, reproach, perdition. The salt burned in his eyes, squeezed shut as if maybe, just maybe it would all go back to the way it was supposed to be if only he could just pray hard enough.

Hunched over, Keith pressed his face to Pidge's chestplate, and let the grief swallow him whole. For an infinite moment, it was just pain; a cold ball in his chest, unforgiving steel, excruciatingly heavy. Over and over again, it was just frozen light and Keith's keening; shivering, stinging. Meaningless, babbled pleas overflowed in fragments. The air itself seemed to rock with him.

And then, distantly at first, the heavy pain became warm. It grew, _fast,_ heating up and spreading out until Keith felt like he was on fire, until it didn't hurt anymore but swelled under his skin anyway. He lifted his head, silenced, the tears streaking down his cheeks slowly evaporating into salt. It grew, warm and constant. The pain melted. Almost as quickly, the grief followed suit, and then the cold. Sensation dissolved, memory scattered.

It was… alien, and yet familiar. _So familiar._

Faintly, ever so distant, like the sound of a sun, a _roar_ reached him.

The images reached him. Instructions, flashing by so fast he couldn't really comprehend them, emotions cleansing the frozen fear within him like holy fire. The heat - _the quintessence_ \- rose in his chest, and he rose with it, let Pidge gently fall to the ground, and turned to face the tree-shrine she'd collapsed before.

 _[Matthew Holt.]_

"No." Keith reached out, pressed his hand against the digital inlay, obscured it. The heat surged, and crimson quintessence flowed out of him, curled around the tree-shrine in bright ribbons. They burrowed into the tree, and above Keith's head the green lights turned red. All at once, the single tree dissolved into a burst of light, red and green showering down around him.

Keith turned over his hand. The instructions played over in his mind, a loop too fast for him to read, but he knew the touch of quintessence. He'd manipulated it plenty of times; through his bayard, through his Blade dagger, through elemental Paladin magic, through coalescence. Focusing desperately, he reached out for the lights and they swirled together into his palm, pulsing and gleaming; for a moment, the red and green fought and roiled like an ocean in storm, and then the green consumed the red.

For a single moment, Keith just stared at it, a shining orb of emerald quintessence, floating half an inch above his palm. The trees were silent in its presence; it whispered all on its own, silent oaths of hope and life.

Keith turned, dropped to the ground, curling his fingers slightly like the orb might turn to liquid, like it might spill out of his grasp at any moment. It felt like it, a phantom sensation against his own quintessence. It was like remembering the feeling of a dream. The orb turned, pulsed light as his knees impacted the ground by Pidge's arm, but it remained intact.

When Keith turned his hand over and plunged the orb into Pidge's chest, it splashed apart. It sprayed across his chestplate, onto her arms, down her stomach, across her helm. Nowhere did it touch anything else. For a moment, the quintessence glowed brighter, even as the warmth in Keith's chest grew brighter and a _roar_ touched his mind again, stronger this time; closer. Then the light sank through Pidge's armour, soaked into her skin.

Keith blinked. Entire universes combusted in that span.

A roar rattled his teeth, closer than the one in his mind, sudden and desperate and elated. He didn't look towards the Green Lion, but he blinked again, and finally allowed himself to hope.

In a burst of sound and air, Pidge jolted and took a breath. Her eyes sought Keith when she opened them, irises glowing a vibrant peacock green. They remained that way, shimmering, as she reached out and grasped Keith's hand.

"Matt's birthday is wrong."


	7. Voltron, of Light

**The last chapter! Whoo! Honestly, I highly highly recommend actually going to AO3 and reading this story on that platform instead - not only is that one somewhat edited and better formatted, but (definitely with this chapter and maybe with the previous ones, I actually don't know) ff/net decides to erase all my internal formatting when I paste it to the doc manager here - so any italics or anything in this chapter that are supposed to be there aren't. If it's in italics here, it's because it's something I caught and manually italicised while I was formatting this, and I honestly cannot be bothered going through it here and making sure everything it right. Just read it on AO3 haha, the platform is so much better.**

 **Anyway, I'll be answering any questions that might be lingering (about the plot, the lore, or just what the fuck I was thinking) over on AO3 comments anyway!**

 **Thanks for reading. It means a lot to me.**

* * *

The first time Voltron did it, they consumed a planet.

* * *

Red landed first, when they finally came back. It had been three and a half weeks since Pidge and Keith had left aboard the Green Lion, on the hunt for her brother. They'd lost four more planets back to the Galra clutches in that time. Progress was starting to be made on repairing the Castleship, with much help from the Blade and much grumbling from Coran about their technique. Personally, Hunk was much more concerned about just getting the Altean and Galran technology and architecture to graft properly than he was about the overall look of the thing. Later, if they lived long enough, then they could worry about making it pretty and uniform. For now, they just needed the Castleship operational. They were desperate.

Technically, progress had been made regarding Allura's arm too, although reality didn't reflect that. The Blade technicians had managed to craft and fit a prosthetic for her; it was derivative of Shiro's, although built lighter and with her agile style of combat in mind. It also lacked whatever nasty Empire surprises they had still to unearth inside Shiro's.

All the same, it lay on a table in Allura's quarters. Next to it lay the socket that she had refused to let them graft to her shoulder. So, technically it was progress, but useless progress. Of course, Hunk understood why Allura wouldn't let the Blade graft Galra tech to her body. It had taken so much time and effort just to get her to trust them, for her to forgive the individuals for the Empire's crimes. Shiro hadn't had a choice, and they all knew that if it could be safely removed, he would lose the Galran arm in a heartbeat. Hunk couldn't blame Allura for making the same choice, even if the source could be trusted.

She stood to Hunk's right, watching the two smallest Lions land; finally home. There was a tension in her back that Hunk didn't envy, a quiver of indecision. She needed more time, really. It had only been a week ago, when Shiro had told them - a shattered, exhausted wreck of Shiro, curled up in his room with Hunk, Allura, and Coran in the dark and away from the Blade members roaming the ship - that Keith had forgotten.

He hadn't meant to tell them. He'd barely been coherent, halfway out of a nightmare and fragile from the flashbacks that had led to them being tucked away in his room in the first place. It had slipped out amongst the panic, just another burden Shiro bore. He'd been frantic afterwards, when he'd realised.

Part of Hunk resented Pidge for keeping it from them. Keith too. But at the same time, Hunk was grateful that she had. He didn't feel the pressure so much, the guilt that came from compassion, knowing that Keith had lost almost his whole life all at once, and he likely didn't even fully understand why anymore; he couldn't remember how much Shiro had meant to him, before Voltron. Hunk had been on the verge of forgiving Keith in a tangible manner anyway, once they came back from their mission.

But Allura… she wasn't. She was already under pressure to forgive Keith. Part of it was her own nature, the bond she'd already had with him, and part of it was Blue. The fact that Keith didn't remember anything before Voltron, before the seven of them, only made it worse. It became so much more than Keith losing control and destroying her home. He'd destroyed his own home. He'd lost his own family.

Suddenly, all his behaviour had made sense. No wonder he'd never even tried to defend himself. No wonder he'd kept his distance from the Blade, even while becoming one of them. No wonder he'd clung so fiercely to Pidge, after she'd forgiven him.

And, barely a week into the mission for Matt Holt, the Red Lion had flown away and not come back.

It had only been days ago - during the time that Coran had now mandated, when the four of them simply curled up together in the dark and forsook their duties for the failing Coalition, and focused on each other - that Allura had even admitted the pressure that put her under. After all, if even Red could forgive Keith, how could she do any less?

She stood on Hunk's right, while the Lions landed and settled, and Shiro stood on Hunk's left, equally as tense. Hunk took Allura's hand and gently squeezed, getting her attention, and then quickly signed a question.

Are you okay?

She offered him a terse smile. "I will be, Hunk." She didn't say any more, didn't share whatever anxious thoughts were on her mind, and Hunk didn't push. She would share them later, if she needed to. Right now wasn't the right time - so instead Hunk glanced back at Shiro deliberately and then signed a second question.

Is he okay?

Allura looked past Hunk to Shiro, "Shiro?" and waited for him to tilt his head towards them. His eyes were covered by a dark visor, one big lens that curved snug across his cheekbones and browline, all the way back to touch his temples. Hunk had only finished them last week, but Shiro wore them almost religiously. The technology in the visor wasn't sophisticated enough to mimic real sight, but it didn't need to be. They were never going to be able to undo the damage coalescence had done to Shiro's eyes, but the visor blocked most of the light and stopped Shiro from being in pain. It came with proximity sensors, and it offered a basic outline of Shiro's immediate surroundings, which let him walk around on his own and not worry about colliding with anything. Covertly, it also monitored Shiro's eye movement and heartbeat; a feature that Hunk had designed to make sure that if anything happened - whether inside his own mind or if he was under attack - that he wouldn't be left alone to deal with it.

"Are you doing okay?" Allura asked him on Hunk's behalf. For a moment, it almost seemed like Shiro might reply aloud, explain himself, but then he simply shook his head and turned back to the Lions. He wouldn't be able to pick out detail or colour, but if the visor was working right then he should see their outlines. Allura exchanged a worried glance with Hunk, and then they too turned back.

Coran wasn't here. Not for lack of trying, but with the Blade here and everything happening at breakneck pace, someone had to help Kolivan coordinate. Things got hectic enough with the bi-weekly breaks they all took. The rest of the time, it was lucky when even just three of them could get away for two seconds. A mixture of guilt and sorrow spun in Hunk's chest. He should be helping still, not standing around doing nothing with both other Paladins, but he couldn't not be here. His family (some of it) was finally coming home.

They waited in silence while the Red Lion sat down, curled her tail around her paws, and went still. She didn't lower her head or open her mouth, and nor did Keith come out. Was he even in there? For a minute, Hunk fought down the fear that maybe they'd been wrong somehow, and she hadn't gone after him. Or, worse, that she had - and she'd failed.

Next to her, Green gently lay down, rested her head on the floor, and opened her mouth. Two figures came walking down her tongue, the smaller one limping badly and supported by the taller.

On Hunk's right, Allura took a short breath and relaxed, a relieved smile breaking onto her face. On Hunk's left, Shiro quivered, hands clenched. If it was working correctly, his visor should be detecting living beings, and then identifying them. It would read both of them as human, but only Pidge would show up as a known life form.

Hunk had never met Matt before. He hadn't been able to program Matt into the visor's systems before.

A strangled sound escaped him, involuntary and meaningless, but Hunk didn't care. The man helping Pidge down from Green's mouth to the floor shared her build, shared her facial features, shared her dark auburn hair. It could only be Matt.

Pidge had been successful. She'd saved her brother.

Finally, something good.

Breaking formation, Hunk ran across the Lion Bay and scooped Pidge up into a hug. He tried to be gentle, but she flinched a little all the same, even as she broke into laughter. "Hey, Hunk," she managed, her voice ragged. She was smiling broadly. "This is my brother, Matt."

Matt's smile was tireder, something underneath it that reminded Hunk of Shiro, but he smiled all the same. "Hey. Nice to meet you. You're a Paladin too?" And pride, there, sparkling in Matt's voice as he glanced at Pidge.

It took all of Hunk's self control to ignore the pit that opened in his stomach and the thought of his sisters. Instead, Hunk just nodded and jerked his chin towards Yellow, peacefully sitting in the back of the hangar and observing. The Lion rumbled comfortingly against the sudden pain in Hunk's chest, and warmth flowed through their link. His shoulders relaxed, and Pidge settled comfortably in his arms.

"Keith's inside Red," she said instead, catching Hunk's eyes. Tone was soft now; reassuring. It didn't really seem directed at Hunk personally; she must be too tired to care about the fragile state of Team Voltron. Hunk went very still, staring back at her, creeping fear peeking around the relief. Pidge's eyes were bright green, no trace left of the sweet amber they were supposed to be. "He'll be out soon. He's been-"

"Shiro?"

Matt's voice was nothing but air, all the warmth gone, replaced by shock and… pain? Uncertain, Hunk looked to Matt, registered the round eyes and tight pupils and parted lips, and then looked back at Shiro. The Black Paladin was utterly still, hands still clenched at his sides, shoulders tight, stiff-backed. Allura was close, murmuring something to him, but Shiro didn't respond. From what Hunk could see of his face, he wasn't even sure Shiro could hear her.

"Shiro!" Matt seemed to have forgotten about them, took a step away.

A visible shudder went through Shiro, and he took a step closer, only to stumble slightly as he immediately stepped back. "... Matt?" Shiro's voice shook.

For a moment, Hunk thought he understood. They'd known each other, before all this. Before Voltron. They'd been on the Kerberos mission together - the mission that had started it all. But then, Pidge let out a quiet, regretful sound. "I'm sorry, Matt. I didn't… know how to tell you." And them there was something deeper there, that Hunk didn't understand yet, couldn't quite pick apart.

Matt barely even glanced at them. He took off, ragged olive green cloak fluttering behind him, and all but collided with Shiro. They stumbled back, lost their footing, and fell. It didn't seem to matter - Matt's arms went around Shiro's waist and locked there, and his head tucked against Shiro's chest. For a second, they were still, and then Shiro put his arms around Matt's shoulders and the sound of sobbing reached Hunk's ears.

When he looked down at Pidge, she looked sad, but a tiny rueful smile was still on her lips. "Damn. I meant to warn him Shiro was here." Soft, regretful but also… pleased? She met Hunk's confused eyes, than glanced towards Allura and was met with the same again. A pause, a tiny shake of her head to herself, and Pidge gestured for Hunk to carry her back towards the group. She must be hurt worse than she looked if she wasn't even trying to walk.

Murmuring resolved as Hunk got closer. Quiet, between jagged breaths, exchanged between Matt and Shiro. "You're okay. How are you okay? You're here! You're okay."

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

And all at once, Hunk understood. Oh. He stepped away, nodded for Allura to come with him, and carried Pidge out of earshot of Matt and Shiro. They deserved their privacy. She came willingly enough, glancing back between the Holts. Only once they had put sufficient distance between them did she settle her gaze on Pidge.

"Pidge… are they...?"

Pidge grinned wickedly, the spark suddenly coming back into her eerily green eyes. "Yeah. And once I can walk without seeing double again, I'm going to make up for years of lost teasing opportunities."

It bubbled up in Hunk's chest, a soft laugh. Broke through. Confused but more relaxed, Allura looked around at them all and then smiled. For a second, everything seemed okay. It wasn't perfect - Hunk wasn't sure perfection existed - and the Castleship was still a wreck, the Coalition was still on the verge of collapsing altogether, but for a moment, just inside the Lion Bay, it seemed alright. Lance was still gone, and Pidge was hurt, and Coran was busy with the Blade even at that moment - but somehow… they'd be okay. They had to be. If Pidge could go out and get her brother, if Red could forgive Keith, if Shiro could be reunited with Matt after everything, then surely they could be okay in the end.

Thud.

They turned.

Behind them, Red sat back up and closed her mouth. At her paws, straightening up, Keith let his hood fall down and met their gaze. His eyes caught on Allura for a second, before settling on Pidge. Half a step forward, just a twitch, like he wanted to come closer - and then a flicker back to Allura and he went still.

Before Hunk could do anything, before Pidge could even speak, Allura strode past them. Anxiety swelled in Hunk's stomach, but he didn't interfere; in his arms, Pidge finally wriggled, tried to drop to her feet, took a breath to call after them. Hunk put a finger to her lips, and when she looked at in incredulously, he just shook his head.

Keith didn't seem to know what to do. He watched Allura approach, lines drawn tight in his face, but he didn't move away. A glance back, at Red, and then back to Allura; his weight went from one foot to the other nervously.

Allura stopped a couple feet away from him, and for a moment they just stared at each other. Hunk edged slightly closer, just to hear. It wasn't what he should do - he should give them space and let Allura have her say in private, but he couldn't help it. What was Allura even going to say to him? In a million years, Hunk couldn't have offered a guess with any confidence. He couldn't imagine what it must be like for someone he considered a brother to destroy his home and hurt another brother.

For a moment, Hunk just stared at Keith.

 _No, scratch that last thought. I definitely know what that feels like._

In silence, Keith waited. He kept shifting, tiny movements: anxiously rubbing one thumb across the back of his other hand, biting his lip, swapping which foot held his weight. Hunk could almost feel the sympathetic fluttering in his own chest, while Keith awaited Allura's judgement.

It stretched out, until Pidge's fingers dug into Hunk's arm painfully and the soft sound of weeping had died out. Finally, Keith lifted his chin and took a breath to speak.

"You destroyed my home." Allura's voice was cutting but even, and quieter than Hunk had expected. Not accusing him - no need to accuse him. She was just stating fact.

Keith hung his head, and his shoulders dropped. The anxiety drained out of him as he deflated. "Yes." Scratchy, even more so than just the fire damage. Taut; delicate. Like he might cry at any moment.

"You're the second person to do that to me," Allura said, in that same somehow gently cutting tone. "You destroyed Coran's home. You attacked Lance, your teammate. You destroyed all our home."

Somehow, Keith seemed small. "I know." Whispered. "I'm sorry. It's not enough, but I'm so sorry."

It hung in the air.

Allura let out a sigh, her hand going to her shoulder, fingers curling around the stump. "This is your home too." Violet eyes shot to her face, wide and confused, uncomprehending. Something like hope lit up in Pidge's searing greens. Quietly, Hunk let out a sigh of relief. "I can't just forgive you, Keith. What you did was… monstrous. But you're one of us." A quick glance at Red. "And you're the Red Paladin. Voltron needs you. And Voltron is bigger than me - than all of us. The universe is suffering, and we have to do something about it."

Still silent, unbelieving, Keith stared at her without blinking. Tiny, shining stars slipped down his face in the form of tears.

"Promise me that you will never do anything like this again, Keith. Promise me that I can trust you. That Voltron can trust you."

Frantically, Keith nodded. "Y-yes. I promise, Allura. I never- I know I- can't make up for it, I know, but… I'll never do anything like that again." Something raw, in his voice. Somehow, this whole thing had always hung on Allura. None of them had ever said it, and Pidge had resented it, constantly fighting against it, but they all knew it. Without Allura's blessing, Keith could never truly be a part of Voltron again.

But Allura was right. All emotions aside, they needed him.

"... Okay." Allura offered Keith her hand. "It's not going to be easy, you know. We're going to have to start from phase one again. You're going to have to earn back Red's trust. You…" and then Allura shook her head, lowered her gaze. "You blew Voltron up in our faces, but we were falling apart before then. We have to put everything back together, properly. We need to be a team if we're going to stand any chance of defeating the Empire."

"I know. I will. I will, Allura - I'll do anything."

"Okay. As soon as everyone is healed… we'll get started."

* * *

The first time that Keith and Allura formed Voltron together changed everything.

In practice, their teamwork remained shaky. Allura couldn't bring herself to fully trust Keith even in practice combat, and it was made all the worse by the fact she couldn't fight with two hands. For the most part, the team tried to ensure that Pidge, Hunk, or Shiro were on her left side, covering her weaknesses, but on the occasions where their movements didn't allow it, and Keith ended up there, it fell apart. Allura tried to cover her own opening and overcompensated, fumbling - Keith tried too hard to prove himself and lost sight of other objectives, creating whole new openings on himself.

Outside of combat training, they struggled to connect. Mind meld exercises that excluded one or both of them were working well, cleanly like they were meant to. Allura had slipped into the same mindspace as the other three Paladins easily, and they already knew Keith's touch so well it was hard to resist the old pattern. With everything they were working towards, none of them even tried. But whenever they tried to induce all five of them, Keith overpowered Hunk and Shiro's minds trying too hard, and Allura resisted his touch and pushed him away, while Pidge frantically tried to mediate and balance. Managing four other minds was too much for her, as it would be for any of them. They always broke apart.

Coran had ordered them to forsake the mind meld exercises and jump straight to forming Voltron. After all, in the beginning they'd had to do the same thing. Pidge rather suspected it was just the nature of humanity; they were, largely, a species of action rather than thought. Hunk was pretty certain it was just them specifically who were so difficult - Keith and Allura were mostly just aggravated with their failure.

It was a strange echo, with Shiro taking charge and ordering them to get along, to get it done. Allura instead of Lance, Keith too eager rather than not eager enough, and yet the ashy taste of nostalgia still stuck in Pidge's throat all the same. It was surreal; the Castleship was grounded, and yet it was busier than it had ever been before, Blade agents running back and forth at all times.

It looked nothing like used to, an ugly patchwork of mixed technology and architecture, but it was starting to look like a real ship again. Purple and blue lights clashed where structures met, but they had a functioning training deck again - even if their practice combat was against Marmoran agents and not gladiator bots.

Pidge was starting to hate the Blade. It was probably the constant bruising; she was really starting to miss the baby settings on the old training programs. As it turned out, the good old 'Knowledge or Death' didn't have an easy mode.

It was better when they fought in their Lions. It still got a little hairy when Keith found himself covering Allura - and once when Allura found herself covering Keith and hesitated, but after the week Keith spent in the healing pod she never hesitated again - but Allura and Blue had found their sync and their bond had grown in leaps and bounds. It was Keith and Shiro and Lance's crazy bond to their Lions all over again. Pidge wasn't sure if she was proud, or supremely pissed off.

The Blade and Coran had restored the teludavs. Whilst Voltron was a little hesitant to use it - they could only go one way, after all - they once again had access to wormholes. They'd spent uncounted hours flying back to planet D6-48Y, carving light into the stars (or, more accurately, keeping a tight formation and dodging Galra space and patrols), but as exhausted as it left them, they kept going. It was the only thing that had allowed them to start stitching the wounds in the Coalition. Once, when they'd been too tired to realise their mistake, they'd ended up so far away it had taken five days to fly all the way back. Pidge didn't even remember the last three clearly. Most of the flight had been inside Green's senses, moulded to her mind so closely that Pidge honestly couldn't have picked them apart, flying together.

They'd all needed a bout in the healing pods after that one.

But they kept going. It was worth it. A lot of the faith in Voltron had been destroyed alongside their own stability; entire planets had willingly submitted back to Galra rule, rather than risk being blown to smithereens. Re-liberating them was a pipe dream, at this point - they had the firepower to do it, individually, planet by planet, the same way they'd done it the first time, but they had no chance of holding all of them, and they needed to do better this time.

For now, they stuck to small rescues; taking out Galra strongholds and information centres, destroying prisons and freeing their slaves and prisoners. If they were going to start liberating planets again, they couldn't just do it randomly like the first time. They couldn't count on the unconditional support and the general anti-Galra sentiment. This time, they had to do better.

They were working on a plan, in between missions, in between responding to individual distress calls, between garnering the support they'd cost themselves. They'd picked a solar system based on Blade information; it was close by, barely two star systems away from D6-48Y, and big enough to present a strong front but small enough to hold with five Lions relatively easily. Their central planet, the basis of their system takeover, was a planet called Naxzela. It was, by the Blade's account, a purely military target - a planet the Galra used for weapons and sentry production.

It was also perfectly positioned to work as an outpost for their most pressing concern. A pair of immense weapons systems called Zaiforge Cannons were currently under construction. It was a secret, of course, but it was nearly impossible to completely hide something that massive and important. The Blade was still working on getting all the information about them, hadn't yet secured blueprints or gotten stable access to the project, but they knew roughly where they being built.

Both locations were within Lion-flight of Naxzela.

And once they took that planet, they could quickly and relatively painlessly expand to holding the whole solar system. Once that was theirs, they could handle the Zaiforge Cannons. Leaving such powerful weapons in Galra hands was something they couldn't afford, but destroying them would be their last resort. Collectively they'd agreed that claiming the Zaiforge Cannons for their own cause was a better, smarter option. It wasn't like they didn't need the extra firepower.

Until then, they needed to play smart. Naxzela and its star system were going to form the basis of their new stronghold. Once the Castleship was capable of spaceflight again, that's where they'd begin. An unspoken opinion, Pidge was fairly certain that once they'd made it there, they'd have to ground the Castleship again and repair it, but getting there was the important part. If they had a solid stronghold - especially in the middle of Galra space with the Zaiforge Cannons at their back - then they could work on expansion from there.

And in the meantime, they ran small missions. Smart missions. Team missions. There was a lot of reasons that they had decided not to run solo missions anymore; in the end, they all boiled down to We don't want to go out there alone. Of course, 'alone' was a relative term, since they had their Lions, but there was something reassuring about the other Paladins' presence that even the Lions couldn't mimic.

Pidge had fallen into the routine that had been established while she and Keith were away with more ease than she'd expected. Conceptually, if the team had just suggested that twice a week they all bundle up in a blanket fort in Shiro's room and share their deep dark secrets, she would have laughed them all the way to hell. Before coalescence, she could only imagine Keith blowing such an idea off - even after, she wasn't sure he'd be down for something like that. Memories or not, Keith was never going to be a totally bare-his-soul kind of dude.

But the team hadn't asked them. They hadn't even really explained. Two days after their return - Pidge had only gotten out of the healing pod that morning - Allura had come to collect them, and quite honestly Pidge had been too relieved that she was willing to even speak to Keith to argue.

And… it felt good. Just being in the darkness with her space family (and her Earth family, Matt cuddled between her and Shiro), even if they spiralled from anecdotes and compliments into sadder and darker territory as the night wore on, even if she ended up crying. Even if it almost felt invasive, when Matt shared what had happened to him after Shiro had saved him from the Pit - even if Shiro fell apart. It still felt good. They were Voltron (Voltron+ with Matt and Coran there) - they were supposed to trust each other with everything.

That first session with all of them, Keith and Allura didn't talk much. They contributed, when Hunk brought up how it almost felt right, except still wrong without Lance. Not aloud, of course; he typed it out on the Altean tablet he carried everywhere, and gave it to Allura to read it out to them. Allura stumbled through the thought, and then handed back the tablet, leaned against Hunk's shoulder. He was right. There was one empty spot in the room, something that was intangible but deafening.

It wasn't until a week later that they broached the subject. It was Keith who did it; in the form of an apology. "I can't imagine how much I hurt you…" Pidge's chest hurt, to listen to him talk. He was fully healed now, but even so his voice scraped in his throat; wounded beyond repair.

Just like all of them. Like Shiro, who could barely sleep for the hellscape of nightmares that plagued him; like Matt, who could get lost in the cold until he was nothing but fear and memory. Like Hunk, who still sometimes forgot that trying to speak cost so much effort and never came out right. Like Allura, who had lost her father and her planet and her home and her arm. Coran, who had never shown any signs of the pain that clung on inside him.

Like Pidge, who had only the week before opened up about the apparitions she'd begun to see - and even then, only because she'd seen them in battle and nearly eaten an ion cannon blast for her trouble. Like Lance, who was - in a best case scenario - Lotor's prisoner; or maybe dead.

And it helped, the two of them finally opening up, being able to say what they needed to without the other interrupting them or dismissing them (that was part of Coran's rules). It didn't stop there being problems with their teamwork, and it didn't fix the attempts at mind melds, but it helped.

Then came the first attack. It had only been a matter of time until the Galra figured out where they were; with Voltron making more and more appearances again, it was only natural that their response increase in kind.

They'd come at team Voltron full force. Four whole battlecruisers and their entourages. On some level, Pidge appreciated the effort; the Empire certainly wasn't underestimating them anymore. It stroked her ego, in some shallow, primal way - so much effort and power, just to try and stop them.

The first two battlecruisers had fallen fairly easily. Shiro and Keith had circled around and attacked one from either end. They carried the bulk of Voltron's attack power - at least compared to the other Lions - and they brought all that power to bear. The ship was ruptured and splintered before Pidge could even get an attack off. Twenty seconds ticked off, the rush of combat and Green howling triumph in her mind, and Pidge's target broken apart too, Hunk and Allura hovering at intersecting points around the wreckage.

But the second two moved past them. Fighters streamed out of the battlecruiser wreckage, the only thing left they had to offer, and those onboard the intact cruisers flowed out to meet them.

Combat engaged.

Pidge was preternaturally aware of the other Paladins as they fought; she never looked up from her own enemies, saw them only in flashes of colour and lasers and the roar of the Lions, but she always knew. It was something she'd noticed, growing stronger and stronger as time went on - she could always find the other Paladins, no matter where they were.

She wished more than anything that she could sense what direction Lance was.

One more battlecruiser went down as they fought on, and it almost seemed the Lions were drowning in wreckage and fighter jets. Pidge couldn't even see properly through the scattered and sparking bits of metal that surrounded them - like a nebula. Like a graveyard.

Then came the cry. Shiro, closer to D6-48Y than the rest of them, fending off those sent to destroy the Castleship. The Blade was on the ground there, to kill anything that made it past Voltron, but if they could prevent any Galra forces from landing then the better. All their non-combatants were down there; not many, of course, but Coran was down there, Matt (much to his distaste), the steadily growing number of people who they'd rescued and couldn't send anywhere else. Shiro was flashing through the sea of fighters, Black's wings extended and shining brilliant blue, light bursting as he teleported from target to target, cutting swaths of destruction as he went.

The battlecruiser was on him. Collectively, the other four circled back and shot towards their leader. Pidge couldn't see the other Lions, but she could feel their energy. A distant flutter against her, a touch of quintessence.

The ion cannon took aim at the Castleship, and Shiro abandoned his post by the planet, teleporting in short bursts towards the cruiser. Red was faster, and she made it just as the purple light bubbled up and ruptured - Keith slammed her bodily into the cannon, the collision violent enough to send shivers racing under Pidge's skin. Red recoiled, tumbling and stunned, but the cannon was knocked aside.

The ion blast tore through the atmosphere of D6-48Y, and struck ocean. Pidge could see the water explode even from space. Thank god we haven't found any natives. A tsunami is the last thing they'd need. Then Yellow tore past her and caught Red, and Blue let off a beam of ice at the base of the cannon, trying to stick it in place.

Around her, everything swirled. The presence of the other Paladins pulsed against her mind, frenzied in battle, even now, disconnected as they were. There was only one more battlecruiser, and surely they should be able to take it down - but the fighters kept swarming. The longer they took, the more there were. It would take too long to hunt down every fighter individually, and even if they could do it (and they could), they'd never hesitated before to fight the easy way, and if they refused to now then… wasn't it obvious? If they were so fractured they couldn't function together, then Zarkon would take advantage of that.

He'd been a Black Paladin, once. He knew their weaknesses. He would know how to exploit them.

Pidge dragged Green around, forsaking her individual fight, and flew for Black. "Guys! Now! Form Voltron!"

Not her place, to give that order. Doesn't matter. Who cares. It couldn't work - how could it work? They'd tried everything to form Voltron, and the closest they'd gotten was a quintessence storm before breaking apart.

(It wasn't an experience she was keen to repeat).

But there was no hesitation. She felt them all streak after her, felt them fall into line. They buzzed against her mind; no thoughts, not yet, but intent. Presence.

Shiro took his place in the centre of their formation, and then everything else slotted together. They were the Paladins of Voltron, and they would prove it. Let the Galra Empire tremble. The light engulfed them, and Pidge relaxed as they finally made connection.

Her breathing slowed, calming and steadying into the battle trance; Shiro, measuring them in eight seconds (four seconds in, four seconds out), holding all five of them in sync as the Lions unlocked into light and sequence and became one. Even as she fell into Shiro's even calm, her heart began to race and thunder in her chest - Keith, a constant battle drum that she could feel span all five of them. The screaming pulse he gave Voltron spiralled out under her skin, an itch she couldn't scratch, the urge to fight, a constant awareness. Shiro kept them synced, but Keith kept them sharp.

But even with the jackrabbit pace of her heart, Pidge felt no panic or fear. Slow and heavy, the warmth that came from Hunk filled her. Combined with the adrenalin and Keith's heartbeat and Shiro's breathing, the warmth made her body feel like liquid - molten steel that was fluid and heavy at the same time. Movement was easy, and yet everything she did held such weight that she didn't dare waste it. Everything felt hyper realistic; almost too real to be real.

Looking out across the battle, every detail picked out in that shining hyper realism, Pidge realised it felt… wrong. Lance was missing. She couldn't… see like she always had before. Voltron was different without him. There was no emergent pattern to the way the fighters wove around them, like deadly hummingbirds. She tried, and she felt Hunk and Keith and Shiro looking for it alongside her - the recognition, the clarity of battle. The things she saw that Lance had always put together. The predictions of movement and tactics that had lent Voltron the inhuman reflexes that they could never achieve on their own.

But a second look, and suddenly Pidge saw something else instead.

Allura was there with them, singing under Pidge's skin. She couldn't see the patterns, and Lance's absence was a piercing agony that rippled out across Voltron, something they shared so deeply that even Allura felt it. She'd never formed Voltron with Lance, she had no idea what it was they were missing, but she felt it with them anyway. And even so, her soul surged up to fill the absence.

Looking out across the battlefield, Pidge could see the spark of quintessence in everything - fizzing and shining in colours she didn't even recognise. She couldn't see the patterns in their enemies' movements, but she could see other things from the flairs of quintessence that lit up their ship.

Pain, desperation. Death, as single flames of life went out; rage as others remained. Overlaid on everything, a constant metallic sheen across the Galra forces, was the glow of fear.

They feared Voltron.

They should.

The actual battle, after that, was little more than a euphoric blur to Pidge. She hadn't realised how much she'd missed being Voltron - being so deeply connected to the other Paladins that no explanations were even needed. Underneath the battleheat, their emotions flowed like a waterfall, all five of them. It was never a coherent feeling, and it wasn't permanent either. Without their minds to stabilise hers, the deluge was too much to process; she remembered the echo of sensation, afterwards, a lingering awareness. Even in fragments, she understood them better than anyone else, and they her.

And afterwards, when they'd landed by the Castleship and disengaged as Voltron, when they'd exited their Lions and tugged off their helmets to celebrate, giddy, when all Pidge could think about was how incredible they were and how much she loved them, she got one more miracle.

Keith had approached the group on the ground, and then collapsed to his knees. Pidge could still sense him, a tremulous, burning presence - overwhelmed, somehow - but he wasn't hurt. She chose not to worry, and instead beamed at him, and then Hunk, and then Shiro. She wasn't sure Shiro could even see it, but he could feel it and that was all that mattered. He grinned right back at them, a smile that wasn't tinged in sadness, finally finally a purely joyous moment.

Faster than any of them, even before Pidge could speak, Allura sprinted across the clearing the Lions had created, dropped her helmet, fell to her knees beside Keith. Only now did Pidge see their tears. Without even hesitating, Allura put her one arm around Keith's shoulders and pulled him into a hug.

Just as fast, Keith wrapped his arms tight around her waist.

"I'm sorry," he whispered, shaking and raw. "I- I didn't know how much- I felt-"

How much pain she's in. Pidge had felt it too, but she'd also felt the elation Allura had felt at finally forming Voltron with them. She'd felt it from Keith, from Shiro. Hunk. Mixed ecstasy and agony. And wasn't that always the way? Voltron had always felt like that. Emotionally speaking, Allura truly wasn't so different to Lance.

It must have been different for Keith. Maybe he'd focused on Allura too closely. It would make sense, considering everything, considering their behaviour.

"I know," Allura whispered back, shaking her head. "I know, I- I felt it too." She squeezed Keith tighter. "I forgive you."

It wasn't a decision Pidge made, but she found herself on the ground with them, putting an arm around them each. On their other side, Shiro did the same, and Hunk somehow managed to hug them all. Allura was shaking, in the middle of the Paladin dogpile. Keith was unnaturally still, eyes wide.

"You…?"

"I forgive you. You won't do it again, Keith. I believe you. I'm sorry. I didn't know." Voice low, a little guilty, but firm. No hesitation, no doubt. Allura was certain of every word.

Keith shook his head. "Don't apologise to me. I- I knew I hurt you, but I-"

"It's okay." Softly, soothingly. "We're the Voltron Paladins. My pain is your pain. Your pain is mine. Your joy. That's what it means. I understand, now. I forgive you. We can do better now, Keith. We have to do better."

Hunk squeezed, met Pidge's eyes for a moment, and just for a moment, she felt his mind flash against hers - like the faintest purr, like the distant touch of someone else's Lion. Her eyes widened, but she smiled and found the words tumbling out of her mouth anyway. "We're already better. We can do this." And she looked away from Hunk, looked at Keith and Allura, and felt it in her chest like packed earth. "We're gonna fuck Zarkon up."

First, they'd take Naxcela and the Zaiforge Cannons. Then they'd take the whole sector. And then, it was only onwards until they could kill Zarkon for good and wipe out the Empire's hold on the universe.

The only direction they could go was forward.

The Galra could keep Victory or Death. They were Voltron. They were only here for victory.

* * *

Voltron had escorted the first Zaiforge Cannon. It was a tiny operation, not counting the five monstrous robots, so in the end they'd all agreed they couldn't risk being away from it. It still sat wrong, deep in Shiro's chest, to let the Blade do all the groundwork for the planetside Cannon - but Matt was piloting the ship that led their assault on the spacebound one.

Even though he wanted someone escorting the Blade - not for lack of trust in them, but because they always seemed so vulnerable despite their strength - Shiro couldn't have left Matt to do this task without him. He couldn't have asked Pidge to walk away from protecting her brother. And it was too risky, sending Keith or Allura or Hunk alone with their Lions.

The gods knew that their bonds were strong, and Voltron was as close now as it had ever been, but in all honesty it was too dangerous to send any of them alone. Solo missions had been abandoned a long time ago now, and for good reason.

So Voltron escorted the first Zaiforge Cannon, Pidge scouting ahead with Green in stealth mode, waiting for the go ahead from Blade forces; Matt following her behind in a small ship, armed with those who'd volunteered from the ever-growing group of refugees that remained on the Castleship. Keith came behind that, a streak of colour in the back whose only purpose was to keep their backs safe. Shiro hated giving up that position, hated being so far back, circling the Castleship with Hunk as Allura wormholed them all into the star system and then swung out with Blue.

But it was for the good of the mission, it was where he fit best, so he let Keith tag ahead and keep Matt safe, and he remained in orbit around the patchwork Castleship. Once they'd wormholed successfully, Coran was left in charge of piloting and Allura joined her team.

By the time they'd arrived and locked into position by the Cannon, Keith and Matt's team had already infiltrated the structure on foot, while Pidge darted around the outside making pinpoint punctures in the hull. She and Keith were working in tandem - her hacking remotely, Keith working internally - to lock off certain sections that they didn't need, to segregate the Galra forces within them.

Pidge didn't even hesitate when she got the go ahead. She broke those sections opened and didn't pause to watch the bodies burst into space.

Watching through Sable's eyes, as they approached and Coran docked the Castleship, Shiro saw the quintessence erupt and dissolve as they worked with deadly efficiency. Sable was a comforting rumble in his soul, but it didn't ease the heavy ache in his chest. Keith had been a child when they'd been dragged into this mess; scarred, all too willing to fight the whole world, but still a child. His child. Pidge had been even younger; Matt's cheeky baby sister. And now they flew as the defenders of the universe.

A burden that led them to slaughter dozens of Galra without a second of hesitation, and then go sleepless with remorse.

And they'd do it again. And again. That was what war was - that was the price his kids were going to pay for the whole universe.

I don't even know when they became my kids. I have got to stop adopting strays.

Sable purred against him, comforting. Hers. Her pride. Shiro felt himself smile, slightly; a distant sensation, so wrapped up in Sable's senses was he, but he felt it all the same.

Yeah.

But Shiro didn't have the time to ruminate on how much damage this war had done to them. Even as his Red and Green worked, the Galra had begun to take action to retaliate. Shiro broke away from the Castleship, sensing Hunk move in the opposite direction, and flew straight for the oncoming battlecruisers. They'd been too far out, in defensive orbit of their super-secret weapon. Voltron had been as careful as possible to make sure the Empire hadn't known about the teludavs being back online.

Shiro shot around it, jawblade flashing into existence. It was barely a conscious motion anymore, triggering it from inside Sable's cockpit. He was merged so closely with her, their senses alight, quintessence boiling together, that it felt like it held between his own teeth. They wanted it - and there it was, caught tight in their jaws, humming with energy as they spiralled and cut swaths of the cruiser away.

Small explosions chased them like firecrackers, and soon enough they let the jawblade dissolve back into quintessence and banked a wide turn back towards the Castleship. In their wake, the battlecruiser - and the half a billion souls it housed - splintered and broke and died. As they returned, on the far opposite side of their claimed Zaiforge Cannon, Shiro could see the second cruiser succumb to the same fate at Hunk and Yellow's paws- hands. Much closer, and of more concern, Allura and Blue - paws spread wide, facing the third battlecruiser.

She hadn't flown away from the Castleship, because the third cruiser had been quicker and cleverer then the others. A capable commander. It had engaged at a distance, taking aim with its ion cannon and firing while only one Lion remained to protect the attacking force.

Blue's thrusters were lit up at full power, bathing her body in warm blue light, and from her open maw poured quintessence in the form of blistering ice; a wide beam that burned brighter than the jetflame and infinitely colder. Where it met the ion blast in space, the clashing energies ruptured and burst into a blinding cacophony. Purple and blue spat in all directions. Under the onslaught, Blue's ice was slowly being consumed - but Allura was smarter than that, and even as she was pushed back the ice spilled out and over, curling into itself, melting and sealing under the scalding ion blast.

Even as Shiro turned and Sable shot towards the cruiser, the ion blast hit the centre of Allura's makeshift ice prism and fractured. It split, and energy sheared off in all directions; weak and spent. A shaft struck Sable as they approached and Shiro hissed in pain at the touch, but Sable merely snarled a challenge and spread her wings. They warped, an acidic constricting feeling that had started to feel good the more they did it, like pressing on a bruise.

An eternity passed in a split second, an infinite moment between realms as they teleported. For just one heartbeat, Sable's mind became words, and then tangible, and then sensation again.

The infinite white plane that Sable used to teleport spat them back out behind that cruiser. Without hesitation, Shiro spun them around, tucked her wings in, folded her paws up against her stomach, and shot straight towards the cruiser's bridge.

And me too. Merciless. We're murderers all.

At the last second, Sable's wings lit and energy scorched through them; blue light encased her front claws as she extended them, made contact with the battlecruiser's hull. The energy rippled back as they collided, and her claws- her paws- her forelegs phased through. Then it dissipated, her wings dimmed again, and physics caught up with them. Sable's transdimensional body emerged victorious against the Galra's ship, and even as she broke through the bridge and dug her claws into the floor the hull behind her exploded, its molecular bonds broken.

For a brief moment, as the chain rippled across the ship like a balloon popping in slow motion, it became the weakest kind of sun.

Sable flew away from it and back towards the Castleship without a scratch.

"Is that all of them?" Allura, slightly breathless but sounding bright - exhilarated, battle-blood roaring. Shiro could feel it; his own, making Sable's body vibrate, and the distant touch of it from the other Paladins. "We should have about half a varga before any reinforcements arrive."

A burst of static from the Yellow - for a moment, Shiro floundered for a response that wasn't Sable's pleased purring, and then he found his way back to his own body enough to remember how to speak. It was very dark inside his Lion. The visor Hunk had made for him (I love him) was set aside for battle. Shiro and Sable didn't fly with the datascreens flashing anymore.

"Yeah, it should be. Circle back, get an orbit going around the Cannon. We need to stay here until the Blade have control of the other one. Once that happens-"

"Yes, yes. Once that happens they can cover each other and we're free to take Naxzela. I remember the plan, Shiro." But he could hear the teasing smile in her voice, the echo of laughter she withheld for the sake of focus. Shiro smiled back.

"Alright, have it your way. Do you want to take point when we for-"

 _Kshhhhh-ttz._

With barely half a second's charging time, the Zaiforge Cannon gathered energy, condensed it into a blazing purple orb, and then fired. The beam shot away faster than Shiro could follow, even through Sable's eyes - unprepared, they couldn't turn in time. They simply rocked in the shockwaves that washed off the blast. Buzzing and bright in the Lions' eyes, the Zaiforge blast sparkled with the quintessence the Galra had stolen from countless worlds, blended with their ion technology to form something monstrously lethal.

Shiro couldn't even see the target they'd been aiming at. The purple went into the distance, so far that it seemed to arc even without an active horizon. Whatever it had been fired on, it was beyond Shiro's vanishing point.

"Keith?" he asked instead, spinning Sable back around and gunning for the Cannon. Allura followed on his heels - a quiver of uncertainty came from Hunk as they shot past, but he took up a shallow orbit and stayed at the rear of the structure with the Castleship. "Was that you?"

"Yeah," came the response, rough but breathless. "This thing is amazing. I just- We just took out the cruiser in orbit around Senfama."

Sable slowed to a drift, Blue right beside her, as they took that in.

"Whoo! Oh, fuck yes. Keith, that's three planetary orbits away! Gotta hand it to the Galra, they really know how to build some fuck ass weapons." Elated, and out of the corner of Sable's eye, Shiro saw the Green Lion do a backflip. He didn't even have it in him to scold Pidge. "Okay, you've got Namora with you in there, right?"

"Yeah. Yeah, she's right here."

"Sweet. Show her how to do the thing and then get your ass back in your Lion so we can siege a damn planet."

It was hard to keep hold of the ache in his chest, when Pidge sounded so delighted, but Shiro managed. They were going to siege an entire planet.

I've got a ten-thousand year old princess and three teenagers and one arm and I'm going to siege a planet. Oh, and the princess also has one arm. Sable, am I a badass or an idiot?

It sounded like laughter, the meowing that rang in his head. She curled around his thoughts protectively, the sound that might be laughter vibrating from her to him. It was infectious - maybe it was madness, then. Oh well. No choice now.

"Namora, you there?"

"Tza!" A half-second went by. "I-! I mean- Yes! I'm sorry! I'm- Yes, I'm there. Here! I'm here." Honestly, it was a waste of time to let it go by, but Shiro found himself grinning all the same. One of the refugees they'd taken in on their various rescue missions, Namora was the only one of the volunteer force to help infiltrate the Zaiforge Cannon who (aside from Keith) could claim Galra heritage. A half-breed born to a low-level soldier on an enslaved planet, she'd been the only survivor of the skirmish that had blown up the factories and her entire home continent. She'd elected to go with Voltron rather than return to her planet.

Of an anxious disposition, but she'd been raised in Galra culture and she picked up their techniques easily. It was only by Pidge's intervention that the Blade hadn't claimed her for their own. "You got this Cannon working right?"

"Yes sir! I have everything under control. Red Paladin Keith showed me how." And one day she'd have to stop addressing everyone by their title, but today was not the day to worry about it.

"Excellent work, Namora. Keep in contact with Kolivan. Cover each other's backs while we take Naxzela." As he spoke, Red disengaged from a hole in the hull of the Cannon and flew around to meet up with Green, and then both Lions circled back to meet up with Sable and Blue. "Actually, cover our backs too."

"Vrepit sa, Black Paladin Shiro!"

It still made him feel weird, having the Galra phrases directed at him like that (as Namora did all too often), but he tried not to project that to the girl. She was just like the rest of the kids; too young to be in this war, but given no choice by circumstance and personal integrity. She knew she could help them, so she'd stepped up despite the fear it caused her. When she offered Galra salutes, it was because that was how she knew to show respect.

"Good work, everyone. Voltron! Let's go."

Allura didn't take point as they took off for Naxzela, although she did offer a cheeky little spiral as the other three got into formation. In response, Shiro flared light down Sable's wings and opened them as they flew. Warm, bubbly amusement floated back from the other Paladins; a flutter against his senses.

A rumble emanated from the Green Lion; Pidge had finally figured out how to rev a Lion. "Okay, enough flirting. Let's go kick some ass."

They were stronger together; it was something that Shiro didn't think consciously, as they lined up and narrowed formation and let the light and quintessence overtake them. They were stronger together and they were unstoppable when they were one. Sable's senses opened wide even as her body unlocked, and the others washed over him and into him as they linked.

Hunk and Yellow, with the warmth of packed sand in his chest and the stable confidence of bedrock. Pidge and Green, a soft but biting embrace like ivy and the threads of thought and strategy just as numerous and sprawling. Keith and Red - magma under his skin and racing heartbeat, eager and ready for battle. Allura and Blue; different, and yet familiar, a quietly rising tide that drowned his unease and gave them the light of the universe.

He could see it, with all of them together; like a map of freeform rainbows. Together, they could see it - and together, they had the power and the will to follow it.

* * *

"We should split! The gravity will exert less on the individual Lions!" Pidge.

"We won't stand a chance on our own! The Lions don't have the individual strength to- tch- to fight this kind of gravity!" Shiro.

"Make a decision! We have to do something, we're dying here!" Keith.

No words from Hunk, of course, but panic and pain rattled Allura's teeth from their bond. She could feel it, balanced against her own like a crystal on the verge of shattering.

Voltron lay, twisted on its side, against the surface of Naxzela. Above them, covering the entire planet like a fiendish spiderweb, the glowing purple energy field pressed down. Buildings crumbled around them, Naxzela compressed by its own compounding gravity. The land cracked and shuddered; Voltron dug a canyon across the city by virtue of its own weight and nothing more.

"Leave Voltron! We need to find out what's causing this gravity well!" Allura herself, spat through the flashing emotions. No real anger there; it was fear that bounced off each of the other Paladins and back into her, and then back to them again. They didn't understand what was happening and it was painful; their bones too heavy inside their bodies, their muscles unable to handle such strain. Voltron couldn't even get off the surface, despite their best efforts - they'd gotten so close.

"Leave- Are you serious?!" Pidge, her voice a shriek. "Have you forgotten about the bajillion sentries still trying to make Paladin rubble out of us?!"

Keith, again, their shared heartbeat thundering in Allura's chest, voice unsteady. "She's right. We have to figure this out so we can stop it." Something sharp flashed across them from Pidge, a vicious ripple, but Keith met it with something softer and Hunk pressed in silently, trying to ease it despite his own panic. "We need data, Pidge."

"I'm calling it. Those towers did this, we're going down one. Everyone out of the Lions. Now. Shields up, watch each other's backs." Shiro, his voice steadier than theirs, commanding - even if they shared his breathing, his ragged gasps, even if they felt the shadow in his mind that the Lions fought back with snarling teeth and flashing claws.

It was barely a decision. Allura found herself locking up her helm and grabbing her bladestaff from the floor, climbing down to the hatch in Blue's throat. She could feel it from the others as well, the movement in tandem - they moved together, almost one unit, just as Voltron did. None of them had ever left the Lions while they were linked together as Voltron; Allura wasn't sure what would happen if they did.

(Pidge was wondering, in reality, but it might as well have been the same thing).

They flowed together once they all climbed out, shields lifting in unison, sensing the flex and flow of each other's bodies. It was a surreal feeling, moving like Voltron but without Voltron at all - shields turning, Hunk in the middle of their formation firing off huge cannon blasts to knock out swaths of sentries, Keith having transformed his bayard into a small, long-nosed gun that Allura didn't recognise but looked like it might be of Galran design, squeezing off shots on anything that got too close. She could feel the unfamiliar ease of it - a skill he didn't have but borrowed from one of them. From her, in all likelihood. Allura was an excellent mark.

When they reached the side of one tower - a terrifying jump and too much jetflame later - they switched formation without a word. Allura, Shiro and Keith formed a wide barrier with Hunk just behind to continue firing back on the sentries, and Pidge behind him again while she hacked the door.

Silently, they urged her to hurry, and her anxiety and panic bubbled back to them. The loop spun them downwards, but Hunk did his best to stay steady, to provide somewhat of a base to work off.

The gravity bore down ever heavier. Shiro was first to drop to one knee, a low grunt of pain that echoed across the link and made Allura's legs burn. She went after, and Hunk after that. Just as Keith was on the verge of giving way, bright elation burned through them like a sun.

"I-"

She didn't get a chance to finish her sentence. As one, Allura and the other Paladins turned, and Pidge leapt before she'd even stopped talking, the others mere half-ticks behind her.

As soon as they were inside the tower, the gravity force eased. Suddenly feeling too light, like the air might burst her lungs, Allura focused on properly controlling her descent. They'd burned a lot of jetflame just to get to the tower in the first place.

"How far down does this go?" Keith asked a they fell, bobbing in coordinated sequence to avoid scorching each other. It wasn't a conscious or practiced activity; they just knew.

Allura shook her head. "I don't know, but… It seems familiar somehow." Frowned, and the unease that caused in the other Paladins crawled down her spine. "It doesn't matter. We just need to get to the bottom of this thing."

It took an achingly long time, burning precious jetflame, but they made it to the bottom. Allura shuddered to think how deep into the planet these towers must be buried - on the outside, bubbling against her like a purr, she could feel how intense the gravity had gotten through Blue. The Lion tried to protect her from it, but it was starting to feel like pain, trickling through from one mind to another.

"What is this place?" said Pidge as they all touched down, jetpacks feeling lighter; Allura prayed they all had the fuel to get back up.

On the verge of answering, but Allura led the way to the doors, sunk into a small portion of the cylindrical tower, gleaming white and blue, and as she approached they lit up. Little wavers of white light pulsed outwards from them, and the others all looked to her as she recoiled, bodies tensing, ready to fight. A moment later, and they saw the flickers, her sight mingled in with theirs.

"Is that… quintessence?" From Keith, low, confused.

Lifting her hand, Allura stepped up to the doors. "Yes. But I don't understand-"

And she reached out with quintessence and the doors opened. Shining behind them, thrumming with light, so white it was blinding against the little faint curls of purple that laced the glow like violet filigree - an immense orb, bursting with power, streaming upwards into the tower and up, further, into the atmosphere. Fuelling the net that was closing ever-faster on Naxzela.

Recognition bloomed in Allura's chest, and not a tick later she felt the unease ripple back fourfold. She swallowed. "This… This is Altean technology." Very soft, stepping into the room with wide eyes.

Pidge and Keith came with her, at her sides, flanking like they were her royal guard. Shiro and Hunk were behind them - Hunk kept one of Shiro's hands in his own, standing almost elbow to elbow. Without the Black Lion, he was blind here, especially with such bright light. But he kept his head up, even if his visor was down and blackened to protect him; only the faintest tingle of pain came from his corner of their link.

"Do you know what it's for, Allura?" he asked; holding tight to Hunk, his heart thundering at Keith's pace, but his voice as strong and steady as it had ever been. It reassured all of them, lifted the stress cascading between them a little.

Allura shook her head, even as she got closer to try and touch the enormous orb, and then memories struck her. "It's-"

"-for terraforming?!" Shreed from Pidge, half excited and half terrified. "Oh my god, that's so cool- Fuck, fuck, we're so fucked. What are we supposed to do about terraforming? There's got to be hundreds of these things on Naxzela - thousands maybe!"

"We have to shut it down. It doesn't matter how many there are, they're all part of one network, right?" Shiro didn't wait for verbal confirmation - he felt it ripple across the five of them and continued. "So if we can get this one to shut down, we can make them all shut down."

Keith was studying the terraforming orb, watching the quintessence he couldn't normally see spiral off the beam streaming upwards. She could sense it in him, the beginnings of an idea, a half-formed plan that probably didn't make sense yet. "... Theoretically that would work, yes, but the problem is getting this one to shut off," she offered instead. "And even if we could safely interface with it, there's no telling how much power is in the network right now. The whole planet is going to combust - and take out several star systems with it. That's a tremendous amount of energy."

"I wonder where it's coming from?" An idle thought from Pidge, watching the light as well, but Allura felt the answer constrict in her chest and a tick later it rebounded back from Shiro - a shared realisation, a shared repulsion. The faint feeling of nausea flashed across them all.

A quick glance at Shiro, but Allura could already feel he was incapable of saying it. It shivered through their bond, a quivering unsteadiness that had them all tighten formation, Hunk drifting closer and offering Shiro more support. None of them acknowledged it, not aloud, but their thoughts spun in closer, centring on Shiro.

Allura stared upwards, towards the surface, and wondered how much of it was left. "... Haggar. This… She must have planned this. To destroy us. We fell into her trap." Her voice oddly empty, even as her hand clenched at her side and shook, even as the rage flew from her and into her friends, even as Keith snarled softly in response and Shiro drank in her fury to quell the ever-creeping fear.

"Allura…" Tentative, from Keith; not with the fear of rejection, not anymore, but still turning words over in his mind. She sensed it, like the half-formed images Blue sent her sometimes - Allura touching the orb. Her eye-scales. "You're…"

Pidge gasped. "You're Altean! You can use magic even without the Lions! Allura-"

"You can turn it off. You can hijack the network, disrupt whatever Haggar's doing-"

"And if you turn it off, we can make sure this planet doesn't blow up and take us all with it."

"If they're safe, the Blade can probably get to Haggar and stop her from getting away-"

"You have to try, Allura. I know you can do this."

She wasn't even sure who was speaking. She could feel it as it compounded, growing between them until she couldn't feel anything else - their sudden hope, their faith in her, morphing slowly into something more violent, an aggressive sort of belief that snapped back at all the uncertainty spilling out of her. Everything seemed to echo, and for a second she felt unsteady - she reached for Blue, too far away, too hurt, still fighting the gravity, and instead she found…

Them.

Her Paladins. Her family. They pressed back, desperate for her to at least try, furiously confident that she could do it.

"I… I'm not… There's so much energy, I don't know if I can control that much…"

But she found herself stepping closer, reluctantly reaching out. She had to try - she can do it, she has to do it, we have to do it.

Hunk and Shiro were behind her. She wasn't sure when they'd gotten so close, but they each put a hand on her shoulders, a constant steadying weight. They were backing her, they'd keep her on her feet. Pidge pressed a hand against Allura's ribcage, right below her hollow shoulder socket, staring at the fluctuating quintessence, waiting for Allura to act. She would watch every reaction, she'd guide Allura when she lost focus, if it was too much to juggle. Pidge would be her aim.

Keith was on her other side, and when she hesitated again, her palm hovering mere inches from the surface of the orb - quintessence spitting and stinging against her skin - he put his hand over hers. "You can do this, Allura." A swift glance around, as Hunk and Shiro repositioned slightly, Shiro standing behind Keith and Hunk behind her. "We can do this."

They touched the orb.

For a moment, it was all Allura could do to hang on, and she felt Hunk press her back against the pressure, the energy and malicious intent surging through her like electricity. She thought she heard Keith groan - was that all of them? Something warm and heavy pressing against her left side, twisting, gripping the tight fabric of her armour and tugging down-

Pidge.

Allura followed that feeling, took a deep breath - Keith's hand pressed against the back of hers, keeping them against the orb, an open channel for the flood of quintessence, sharing it with her. It flowed back out of them, quickly losing momentum until it sloshed back against Shiro and Hunk. Beside her, Pidge soaked up the leftovers, looping it back into the Lions, her focus entirely on them. Her eyes were locked upwards on the quintessence stream, glowing a brilliant emerald as the energy went through her.

 _Patience yields focus._

She wasn't sure who that was. It could have been Shiro or Keith. It could have been both. It didn't really matter. Allura took a deep breath, reached for Keith, drew him closer. They had to work as one if they were going to do this, even more than normal. All her walls had to come down - all her inhibitions.

Keith first, because he didn't hesitate to respond, thoughts and feelings and senses merging together until it was hard to even differentiate themselves. They drew in Shiro next, then Hunk, then Pidge. Pidge hovered, surrounding them all, a close link to what was going on outside them rather than inside.

And slowly, they took control of the quintessence stream.

It was a lead, and a quick second, with the power and the structure behind, keeping them steady. It was more than just each of them, more than just all of them - it wasn't anyone, it was magic and Voltron and slowly, ever so slowly, they bent the quintessence and brought it to muster.

Allura took hold of the core, and the others were pushed out, scrambling, clawing at the loose threads to keep it together. They couldn't get this deep, even with her there, even locked into her magic.

Her face burned, two little curves under each eye, like fire. Like being branded. It was too much, but she had to - everyone was counting on her. They were so close, so so close, even pushed away from this core, even…

Allura throttled the quintessence flow, squeezed with every tiny scrap of force she could muster, trying to kill it. For a tick, it dimmed - then flickered - then died. Elation formed around her, pressing in from all sides, half a tick of it, just a fraction of a heartbeat.

Success.

And then cold.

Something so utterly cold and cruel touched her instead, wove through her hands, through her thoughts.

It reached through her, swept through the other Paladins - so cold and so, so vicious, hateful; hope and triumph fled them, fear broke open within their bond like a damn and then vapourised into nothing, and then there wasn't even thought. They were cold and hollow, floating, suspended in the blazing white as quintessence erupted to life again.

Around them. Inside them? They couldn't tell. Everything was white and nothing, an inverse void, a flood without water. The cold spiralled deeper, consuming everything-

It touched the Lions.

It wasn't a roar that echoed back, it was a scream. Like the Lions were in agony - crushed and desperate and cold, and the whiplash blew them back like an explosion. For a second, Allura remembered who she was, felt Blue pulse bigger and brighter and press against her. Blue breached her mind, like a tangible violation, protective barriers popping around her soul like soap bubbles. Quick on her heels were the other Lions, an onslaught of energy - Voltron, the heartbeat of infinite power, except all comfort dissolved to nothing as they entered her.

The other Paladins winked against her consciousness like stars, distant and burning in desperation, little flickers of colour against the cold and the white and the Lions. Pain radiated off them, spreading through her instead of warmth, and dimly she became aware of her own.

Agony.

Was she screaming? Were they? Was that the Lions? She couldn't tell. Couldn't remember, couldn't see - nothing was real, just the pain and the light and the Lions, howling a symphony inside her mind.

Her minds.

Their minds?

Everything shuddered. The world cracked.

She'd felt this before. Distant memories of ice filling her body, the acid as skin and muscle and bone dissolved - fear flickered once more, a desperate reflex, but it died under the white pressure of the Lions and the light. It filled her throat, the feeling, the quintessence - like swallowing ice. Vomiting ice? She couldn't tell. Lost, directionless, overflowing-

Agony split her thoughts, pulsing out as if it was blood and her body had ruptured.

There was a thin wail, somewhere, inside her. Something…

The trickle of water. Just a drop. A tiny ripple in a tiny puddle of a tiny lake. Rain, glinting azure light - numbness and panic and a surge of-

Nothing.

The light shattered.

* * *

He felt it before they even dropped out of hyperspace. It was like a tingle; ice held against his skin, pleasant and painful at the same time, a cooling burn on a hot beach day. Fingers gripped tighter around the handle of his dormant bayard, and he let the energy trickle down his arm and out through it.

Frost formed on the floor below him as it dripped down.

"Lance?"

It almost felt good despite the curling dread it brought to his chest. He'd been looking forward to this, desperately, for so long - but Blue's distant touch wasn't gentle or comforting like he'd dreamed. There was no cooling ocean to be found there, not now. There was only the ice. Still, he let the freezing quintessence whirl through his body and drip from his bayard, because it was better than the numbness. Even Acxa's hand on his shoulder was nothing more than vague weight.

Lance shook his head. "Something's wrong. I think- They're in battle. I think they're going…" He stopped. Surely the universe wouldn't be that cruel. He couldn't be showing up during that again - but it tickled something in his mind, something like poetry. It was oddly poignant.

He'd been broken away from Blue during coalescence. He would return to her during coalescence. As if no time had passed.

But it has. And Lance knew better now. He could fight better now - he knew the touch of magic.

"Acxa, make sure we drop with shields. Blue's going coalescent. It must be Allura. We're going to have to help them." His bayard morphed as he spoke, glowing with the excess quintessence; a long blade, white and blue, heavy but symmetrical and perfectly balanced. The edges of the Altean broadsword glowed softly with ice, widening the blade.

The air around him began to chill; he couldn't feel it, but Acxa stepped away and he saw the telltale lift of the fur under her ears and down her neck. "Uh… You know, just a thought, but maybe you should like… go outside?"

All eyes flashed to Ezor for a second.

"What?" Her face took on a slightly deeper orange hue. "Oh, don't look at me like that - obviously not while we're in hyperspace but… I mean, you're still a Paladin, right? Look at you, you aren't even fully established back with your big kitty and you're glowing!"

"That's a good point."

Firm but soft, yielding to her thoughts but acting as an ultimate authority. Lotor wasn't even in the room, but the weight still carried across the comms. Lance's other hand clenched at his side - it was nothing like being led by Shiro, but he had become accustomed to it none the less.

"Lance, make your way to the docking bay and be ready to eject as soon as we drop into normal space. I trust you can control yourself, but I'd rather you didn't blow up our only ship." A trace of amusement, but nausea and memory lurched in Lance's stomach. Flames and fear and drowning inside Blue. Stranded in a dying Castleship, lost in flames in violet eyes.

He swallowed it, focused on the ice filling his body, weaving through every part of him until even his blood felt cold. It was better than the numbness that pervaded him normally - the touch and thread of magic that made him feel alive. "Yeah, sure thing. Try not fuck this up, Acxa."

An acknowledging grunt, and her middle finger lifted in his direction (a flicker of satisfaction, that at least however much he'd changed, they'd changed too), and Lance took off for the main bay. There wasn't much selection, on the lone lightcruiser they'd taken with them upon fleeing the Empire, but Lance knew he'd need to space. Controlling magic was one thing, the energy woven into his soul from when Blue had bound them together, but he knew that if he was headed for coalescence, that would be another thing entirely.

Still, he had to try.

The feeling grew stronger, even as he ran, glowing sword in hand. It started to pound in his chest, louder than his heartbeat - a waterfall that threatened to douse his soul and consume him with energy.

A familiar feeling.

Stronger, and Lance felt as if he was running upstream, fighting the rising tide with nothing but open air above his head, but he took a breath and kept going. He'd felt this before, even if it had always been weaker. He'd overcome this already. He just had to find the currents - a riptide was nothing if he could recognise its flow and manipulate it himself.

Vision flickered, but Lance fought back - for a second the ship vanished, a step into the void, nothing but boiling ocean and fathomless water. It felt like he was floating and falling at the same time.

He let the magic burst out of him, focused on the shadows instead of the light. He couldn't quite see clearly, tearing his way down to the docking bay, but he could see the shadows of where things were; the vacancy they left behind rather than the space they occupied. He reached the end, touched the panel - swirling energy crackled and warning lights went off as the ship doors began to open.

Screaming whirling colour whipped by, overloading even the icy white-blue pouring off his sword, from his eyes, his mouth, from every part of him. It felt like drowning in technicolour.

"We're dropping. See you on the other side."

The sickening rainbow of hyperspace vanished.

Lance had already jumped, but the quintessence hit him and he screamed, convulsing, tumbling into nothing. Blue surged into his mind, overtook everything - he couldn't breathe, a crushing weight squeezing everything out until he felt flat and unreal. Flickers touched him - panic, the desperate agonies roars of the Lions - a faint flicker of scent, like flowers, and then ash and lightning and dust and wet leaves, and too many thoughts throbbed against his own. Pulsing, in his skull, like the bone came in while his brain went out. His whole body felt like it might inverse.

Pain engulfed him, so acute a sensation that he hadn't felt for months.

But his bayard was in hand,the heavy Altean blade, and Lance found the riptide in the flow, sunk into it, let it rush through and down through the sword.

When he opened his eyes, he could see again.

He was floating in space, and the pale blue light had to be coming off him, the curls of ice like invisible glinting glass spilling into the vacuum uncontrollable as quintessence rushed out of him. Not his own - too strong, too much, a searing flow like being waterboarded from the inside out, like liquid fire - but he let it flow through him, let it escape in any way it could, let his bayard burn in his hand like a star.

His attention, what there was of it, went twofold. Lance didn't care about the ship behind him, didn't care about the Lieutenants fighting or Lotor zipping around in his fighter jet, didn't care about the constant buzzing back and forth in his comms. He cared about the other ship, huge - bigger than even a battlecruiser - and the huge gleaming purple bubble that protected it. A huge attachment that hung below the main cruiser, like a bloated abdomen on a metal spider, surrounded by a particle barrier with hexagonal weave so tight Lance wasn't sure he'd have been able to breach it even with magic. Even as he watched, red lights struck and sheared off into nothing, and the buzzing in his ears shot up an octave in response.

Distantly, he wondered why Zethrid had even bothered firing upon it. Red sheared off it again, passing over him as it did; the blue light blistering off him consumed it without resistance.

In the opposite direction, far in the distance, his whole body vibrating as he fought the urge to drift closer and floated in the current of magic that was here and now, was a planet. Lance wasn't entirely sure how he knew it was a planet, but he knew.

Blue was there.

Blue, and the other Lions, and the other Paladins, and he could feel them in the flow, feel their touch and their power like ribbons braided into the riptide and the current. Tangible colours, lost sensation against skin he knew had no nerves left, but it was like breathing in life. Like drinking hope.

He pressed back against them, wove his own magic into theirs, and felt them thunder in response.

Lance - Here - Alive - Lance - Lance - Here - Lance - ALIVE - Lance - Lance

Voltron was on that planet. Voltron was there, Lions and Paladins melted down into light and power and a single entity, and Lance would lose himself in that whirlpool if he let himself,

He wanted to.

But the pain flew from the swirling ocean currents from them to him, and the gleaming purple ship remained in sight, in mind. Voltron was there, but it was in trouble, it was wounded - fighting, together, coalescent, burning itself out just to survive - Voltron was failing.

Lance turned to the ship, the sickening violet light trickling from the protected abdomen out towards the planet - towards Voltron - like slender, twisting fingers. It was barely visible to him, just shimmers that slipped in and out of reality - but Lance knew they were there. He could taste them, washing past his own quintessence, past Blue's, past Voltron's.

He changed his grip on the sword. Ice sheathed it, rushing outwards, the metal blade dwarfed by the ice blade that grew out larger than Lance's whole body, and even that was dwarfed by the light that continued further, larger than the lightcruiser, like a Lion made weapon in its own right. Everything was weightless in space - he felt weightless, nothing but power and light and thought, navigating the riptide outflow as it crashed and eddied around him.

Lance lifted the sword, high, far above his head, and then slashed down across the tendrils of light.

In space, nothing changed. Quintessence winked away from him in spirals, gleaming ice and blinding light. But the threads snapped and recoiled back towards the enemy ship, and Lance felt the shockwave ripple through him.

There was a sound - not a sound, but like a scream, somewhere distant, somewhere inside him. The pain coming from Voltron abated. In its place came fury - a thunderous vengeance, a rage that swept Lance away and took him under with it. You hurt us. Unacceptable.

Die.

He turned, unable to swim any longer, vision flickering, awash in the sudden lack of pain, the surge of power. The crushing weight seemed to disappear, Voltron rising up inside him, surrounding him from within, consuming everything. The universe was ringing in his ears. Voltron wasn't losing anymore.

They were winning. They would win. They had won. Nothing would hurt them. Not here, not again - there would be nothing left to hurt them. Never again.

Fury filled his mind, bubbling lava and crashing frozen waterfalls and thundering earthquakes and storms and disasters and more than Lance could contain. It didn't even hurt when it broke out of him. He didn't even cry when his body broke, when it felt as if his skin peeled back from his body and there nothing but the shimmering rage underneath. He wasn't even real anymore - how could he swim this tide, this tsunami, when he was nothing but light and intent himself? He wasn't surfing it - he was part of it. A speck of foam on a wave that could eclipse the whole universe.

The sword lifted.

Unacceptable. We will drown you.

The sword fell.

* * *

Shouting had long since stopped being worthwhile. Shiro hadn't responded since the strange purple shell had encased Naxzela - none of the Paladins had. Coran was still trying to establish communication with them from the Castleship, had stayed behind to protect the spacebound Zaiforge Cannon, but Matt was already long gone.

Too close, he knew, too close to the planet that sure was a trap, that surely- couldn't become Voltron's grave. It couldn't. It couldn't, it couldn't - it wouldn't be fair, it wouldn't be right. Voltron was too powerful to fail like that, such a simple trap couldn't have fooled them all.

He couldn't lose them all again. He couldn't watch his sister die for this godforsaken war. He couldn't lose Shiro a third time.

When the light came though, he stopped. It had begun as pinpricks, little coloured stars that shone through the purple shell, and Matt had slowed his flight - and then they'd eclipsed the shell and the whole planet and Matt hadn't even been able to look directly at it.

Flashes of colour filled his cockpit, and the ship swayed even though he'd let it drift to a standstill.

Turbulence.

He'd felt cold, when he'd made himself squint back towards Naxzela, eyes so narrow he could barely see through the thick black blur of his eyelashes. He couldn't pick out anything through the multicoloured light, but his ship shuddered again, space itself quaking, and the stories flashed through his head.

Coalescence. He'd never fully understood the terrified awe that all the others had spoken about it with, the thinly veiled fear and shame and desire all mixed into one. Of course, something like that would be powerful - incredibly so. Voltron was the most powerful weapon in existence. In multiple universes should he and Pidges theories and Coran's historical knowledge hold up. Of course something like coalescence would be scary.

But he couldn't even look at it. The space around Naxzela thundered and shuddered silently, and Matt could feel the heat even through his solar shields, even two entire orbits away, couldn't see anything through the light except colour.

Pidge was inside that somewhere. Shiro was inside that. The Paladins were inside that power, conduits for it, nothing but jacked up power converters to translate the Lions into an elemental storm. They were inside that, and Matt couldn't even get closer than half a star system.

He'd been cold, despite the heat, and he couldn't do anything but wait.

And then, a spark of fear and hope all at once that made his heart drop and his stomach backflip, a burst of static on the radio. In the far distance, far on the left of his viewscreens, a flash of light - pale blue. Twisting, glowing - something went past him like a silent whine, a sting. Matt couldn't put his finger on it.

It felt like a ripple that came from inside him, except it flowed out from the faint pale blue and rushed across his body like an echo. He shuddered.

Static again, the light pulsing brighter, and Matt closed his eyes. Even then, hands covering his face, visor down and darkened, all he could see was blinding white. The static went louder, and then flickered into noise - voices - screaming. Screams, thunderous in his ears - screams of pain, of fury, screams - but it meant they were alive. Voltron was alive, and if Matt could hear them then the shell must have cracked around Naxzela, the interference must have been broken.

His ship rocked.

Another echo across his skin, like a tangible shadow, and then shouting, and-

His ears rang in the sudden silence. It was almost worse than the explosion, than the light dying all at once. Everything just seemed to… stop. He couldn't even see, when he dared open his eyes, everything shimmering white and yellow and black in the afterimage of the light.

But his ship was still, the comms were silent, and the light had died. Like a snapshot - like turning off a lightswitch. Too sharp, too sudden - Matt felt disoriented, like he'd lived a jumpcut, like the whole universe had just turned off for a moment. Nausea bloomed and the acid tasted vile, but it gave him something other than the hollow ringing to focus on.

Slowly, Matt blinked away enough of the afterimages to pick out Naxzela.

What was left of it.

The planet was gone, a halo of debris and burning asteroids that still spun out. It would take time to settle. Naxzela was nothing but shrapnel now. Glinting faintly, in the centre of where it had been minutes before, like five orbiting ghosts, were the Lions.

Matt couldn't quite tell, tried to enhance his view of them, but red flashed in his cockpit and errors flared to life across his viewscreens. The Lions were distinctly separated, and he didn't think they were moving. Fear coiled under the nausea, one hand clamped over his mouth and his teeth ground shut. Tears pricked, finally, at the corners of his eyes.

But the Lions had gone dim before. Always did after coalescence, according to Coran. Normal. Matt didn't need to be so afraid.

Static erupted from the comms.

Then, slowly, it resolved into a voice.

"Hello, Voltron. What's left of you. I think it's time we had a little chat about peace."

Matt didn't know that voice. It was lilting, only the tiniest edge betraying- weariness? Fear, anger, desperation- Don't know, doesn't matter. Who cares. Need to get to Pidge, need to get to Shiro. Ship's fucked, I can't move - I need to get to the Lions.

Coran's response was a low hiss, crackled across the radio, and only one word: "Lotor."

Something cracked inside Matt's chest. It felt… suddenly smooth. Calm. As if his heart was glass. He focused dimly on the viewscreens, on the tiny ship that was left far in the distance - the only thing still alive amidst the wreckage of a battlecruiser and thousands of Galra fighters.

"I don't come to fight you, Altean. As you might have heard, I've been evicted from the Empire and branded a war criminal. You and I want the same thing - peace. I'd like to propose an alliance."

He sounded so… Despite the edge to his voice, Lotor sounded so calm. As if he was somehow still in control, as if the honey in his tone could sweeten the memory of all the terrible things he'd done. As if Voltron would ever consider an alliance with the Galra Prince. Matt wanted to spit, he wanted to scream and rage and break Lotor's face, but the glass in his chest beat like a crystal chime, and instead his voice came out cold and hollow.

Matt could barely even hear himself. "We decline. That's never going to happen."

A soft chuckle, and the glass shattered. Red blurred across Matt's vision. Bile rose in his throat like venom, the rage overpowering his other emotions, stomach revolting against it, too much emotion and stress for his body to handle.

"I would reconsider that response, if you wish your other Blue Paladin returned to you."

Lance. Lance, the man Matt had never met, the mysterious Blue Paladin who wasn't Allura, who was nothing more than just a floating name and painful memory and the shared tears and anguish of the others on dark and quiet nights together. Lance.

Matt couldn't speak, but Coran's voice shook when he did.

"We accept."


End file.
